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MEDITATIONS 

UN THE 

PASSION 

OF OUR 

LORD JESUS CHRIST. 

BKOTHER PHILIP, 

SUPERIOR-GENERAL OF THE BROTHERS OF THE CHRISTIAN SCHOOLS. 

13 No^-x.^jJl; 



(Translate!) from the -tfrnub. 



New York: P. O'SHEA. 

West Chester: N. Y. CATHOLIC PROTECTORY 

;1872. 



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\* 



Entered, according to Act oi Congress, in Hip year W79 t>j 

.lollN P. MI IM'IIY. 
in the Office ot the Librarian >>1 (\jntciess. at Washington 



Stereotyped aud Primed at the New York l 
Catholic Protector}', West Chester. X. Y. S 



PREFACE. 



Meditation is the first of religious exercises ; but 
amongst the different subjects for meditation, are not 
those which relate to the Passion of Our Lord Jesus 
Christ the first ? 

Meditation, as St. Francis de Sales expresses it, has 
always for its object the love of God and the practice of 
virtue, and it is so much the more useful in as far as it 
leads efficaciously thereto. But how great, then, is the 
utility of meditations on the sufferings and death of 
Jesus ? What can there oe more calculated to excite 
in our hearts love and gratitude to God ? What 
more proper to maintain, develop, and strengthen, 
the spirit of piety, the courage of sacrifice, the 
will to belong to God and that for ever 1 

Yes, there is there an abundant source of most 
precious graces, the principle of a supernatural strength 
which renders the Christian patient and resigned in 
adversity, firm in the combat with the enemies of 
salvation, courageous against self. 

All the Saints have experienced this ; and they teach 
with St. Bonaventure that "pious meditation on the 



IV PKEFACE. 

Passion of Jesus Christ delivers the Christian from all 
evil, draws down upon him all sorts of favors, procures 
for him the grace of God in this life, and the immortal 
pledge of his glory in the other." 

We have, therefore, some reason to think that we 
would be useful to our Brothers in presenting them with a 
series of subjects for meditation on the Passion of Our 
Lord Jesus Christ. 

Each subject comprises three parts : the consideration, 
or contemplation of the mystery ; the application, 01 
practical consequences which are most .directly derived 
from it ; and the prayer. 

We have chosen a sufficient number of subjects to 
have one for each Friday of the year, and some others 
over and above, for the two last weeks of Lent, during 
which we are specially bound, according to the spirit of 
the Church, to meditate on the sufferings and death of 
Our Lord. 

In order that meditation on the Passion of Jesus 
Christ may produce its fruits, it is requisite, besides 
the preparation: — 1st, that the subject be read slowly 
and distinctly ; 2d, that while meditating, we do not lose 
sight of the greatness of him who suffers, for whom he 
suffers, what he suffers, and how he suffers ; 3d, that each 
one regard the Passion as having been suffered specially 
for himself, as Jesus Christ would have done even for 
one single man all that he did for entire humanity. 



The sentiments which are the most in accordance 
with the subjects on which we meditate, and which we 
have, consequently, reproduced the oftenest, are : — 
admiration, love, gratitude to Our Lord, and contrition 
for our faults. It seems to us that there is less need of 
varying affections, than of exciting strongly within us 
those which are fundamental and may lead us most 
effectually to the practice of good. 

As far as possible Ave keep to the subject in hand, we 
fix our eyes on Jesus suffering or dying for us, and we 
turn them not away : we merely point out, in the form 
of exhortation, the immediate practical consequences 
which are the spirit of the mystery we have been 
contemplating. 

We have proposed to ourselves to speak much more 
to the heart than to the mind ; it seemed to us more 
advantageous to trace touching pictures adapted to 
captivate the imagination : such are the principles that 
have guided us in the compiling of this little work. 

May these meditations produce some good, keep alive 
in souls the spirit of prayer, and make us love our 
adorable Savior more and more ! Then we shall bless 
him for having inspired us to prepare them, and Ave 
shall bo happy in having contributed in some measure 
to make him known, loved, and glorified ! 

BROTHER PHILIP. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



Preface .... 

MEDITATION. 

I. The Passion of Jesus Christ in General 
II. Jesus Goes from the Supper-room to 

Garden of Olives 
UJ. Sadness of Jesus in the Garden of Olives 
IV. Prayer of Jesus in the Garden of Olives 
V. Jesus Sweats Blood and "Water . 
VI. The Sleep of the Apostles 
VTI. Courage of Jesus after his Prayer 
VIII. The Kiss of Judas . 
IX. Jesus Taken by the Jews 
X. Jesus is Brought to Jerusalem . 
XI. Jesus before Annas 
XII. Jesus is Brought to the house of Caiaphas 

XIII. Jesus before Caiaphas . 

XIV. Jesus Receives a Blow . 
XV. Jesus Accused by False Witnesses 

XVI. Jesus Condemned in the Court of Caiaphas 
XVII. Jesus Ill-treated in the House of Caiaphas 
XVIII. Denial of Jesus by St. Peter 
XIX. Conversion of St. Peter 
XX. Jesus Confined in a Dungeon 
XXI. Jesus is Brought to Pilate 
XXII. Despair of Judas 

XXIII. Causes of the Destruction of Judas 

XXIV. Jesus is Presented to Pilate 
XXV. Jesus is Questioned as to his Kingdom 

XXVI. .Silence of Jesus before Pilate . 



PAGE. 

iii 



the 



7 

13 

19 

25 

31 

37 

43 

49 

55 

61 

67 

73 

79 

85 

91 

97 

103 

109 

115 

121 

127 

133 

139 

145 

151 



Vlii CONTENTS. 

MEDITATION. 

XXVII. Jesus is Sent to Herod . 

XX y 1 1 1- Jesus is Sent back by Herod to Pilate 

XXIX. Jesus is put on a Par with Barabbas 

XXX. The Scourging . . ' 

XXXI. Jesus is Crowned with Thorns . 

XXXII. Jesus is Shown to the People . 

XXXIII. The Jews continue to Demand the Death of 

Jesus ..... 

XXXIV. Jesus is Condemned to Death . 
XXXV. Jesus is Loaded with his Cross . 

XXXVI. Jesus Carries his Cross . 

XXXVII. Jesus Falls under the Weight of his Cn 

XXXVIII. Jesus Meets his Blessed Mother 

XXXIX. Simon the Cyrenean Helps Jesus to Carry his 

Cross ..... 

XL. A Pious Woman Wipes the Face of Jesus 

XLI. Jesus Consoles the Holy Women 

XLH. Jesus is Stripped of his Garments 

XLIII. Jesus is Fastened to the Cross 

XLIV. Jesus is elevated on the cross 

XLV. Jesus on the Cross 

XL VI. Jesus Prays for his Enemies 

XL VII. The Good Thief 

XL VIII. Jesus Gives us Mary for Mother 

XLIX. Abandonment of Jesus on the Cross 

L. Jesus says: "I Thirst." . 

LI. Jesus says : All is- Consummated." 

Ln. Jesus Commends his Soul into the Hands of his 

Father 
Lin. Jesus Dies on the Cross . 
LIV. Jesus Pierced by the Lance 
LV. The Five Wounds 
LVI. Jesus is Taken down from the Cross 
LVTI. Jesus is Placed in the Tomb 
LVIII. The Sepulchre of Jesus Christ . 
LIX. The Kesurrection of Jesus Christ 



CONTENTS. IX 

FEASTS RELATING TO THE PASSION. 

MEDITATION. PAGE. 

LX. Good Friday . . . . .355 

LXI. Holy Saturday . . . . .361 

LXH. Finding of the Holy Cross (3d May) . . 367 
LXIII. The Precious Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ 

(1st Saturday of July) . . .373 

LXIV. Exaltation of the Holy Cross (14th September) . 379 



OTHER SUBJECTS RELATING TO THE PASSION, AND CONTAINED 
IN THE BOOK OF THE RESUMES. 



The World Opposed to Jesus Christ 

Hatred of the Pharisees for Jesus Christ . 

Jesus Accepting, Desiring, Sufferings and Death 

Passion of Jesus in General . 

The Five Wounds .... 

Repose of Jesus in the Sepulchre . 

Invention of the Holy Cross (1st subject) . 

The Precious Blood 

Exaltation of the Holy Cross (1st subject) 

Patience of Jesus Christ 

Relations between the Sacrifice of the Mass and 

the Cross ..... 
The Heart of Jesus in its Sentiments as Victim 
The Wound in the Heart of Jesus . 
Compassion of the Blessed Virgin . 
Mary on Calvary .... 



that of 



PAGE. 

41 

59 

59-60 

61 

62 

62 

120 

128 

142 

278 

362 
372 
376 
426 

427 



MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

OF 

OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST, 



FIRST MEDITATION. 
THE PASSION IN GENERAL. 



' ' Behold, we go up to Jerusalem ; and all things shall be 
accomplished which were written by the prophets concern- 
ing the Son of Man." — St. Luke, xviii. 31. 



CONSIDERATION. 

In imitation of all the saints, let us make it our prin- 
cipal occupation to recall, and to meditate upon, the 
passion of Jesus Christ ; that divine Savior wishes it, 
the church exhorts us to it in a thousand ways, — this 
exercise is besides most fruitful in grace. 

Jesus Christ invites all men to nourish their mind and 
their heart with the memories of his passion. Thus he 
would have it prefigured and foretold, in order that all 
the natives of the old law might contemplate, in the 
future, the august sacrifice by which they were to be 
redeemed, and of which all the others were but 
prophetic symbols. 

He himself announces to his apostles, and to all the 



1 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

Jewish people, that he is to suffer: " as Moses," said 
he, " lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the Son 
of Man be lifted up."* " He must suffer many things, 
and be rejected by this generation. "t " Behold, we go 
up to Jerusalem, and all things shall be accomplished 
which were written by the prophets concerning the 
Son of Man ; for he shall be delivered to the Gentiles, 
and shall be mocked, and scourged, and spit upon ; and 
after they have scourged him, they will put him to 
death."| 

Yes, he wishes us to remember him, and what he 
suffered. He, moreover, manifests it to us by his Church. 
What does not that tender mother do to remind us of 
the sorrow, the ignominy he endured for us ! She 
celebrates unceasingly the sacrifice of the altar, which 
is the continuation of that of Calvary ; she gives the 
figure of the cross as a distinctive mark to her children ; 
she places everywhere before their eyes the image of 
Christ crucified, and wishes it to be in all their dwell- 
ings. By her saints, by her devotions, by her ministers, 
she speaks, as it were, incessantly of the sorrows of her 
divine Spouse. 

Let us answer her intentions. Ah ! should not we 
Religious meditate especially on the Savior's Passion "? 
All in the life we have embraced, speaks to us of Jesus 
suffering ; this image is constantly before our eyes ; we 
have in hand, and even carry always about us, the 
sacred book which contains the recital of his sorrows. 

Let us place ourselves, then, before this subject so 
supremely important and so rich in fruits of salvation ; 
* St. John, iii. 14. f St. Luke, xvii. 25. J Hid., xviii., 31-3o. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 



who he is that suffers, why and from whom he suffers ? 

He who suffers, is the Sou of God made Man, God 
himself. Ah ! what a mystery ; and how can we recall 
it without being seized with astonishment and filled with 
adoration ? The Eternal, the King of heaven, descends 
into the very abyss of annihilation ; he whom angels 
adore, is the butt of mockery and derision ; the Holy of 
Holies, the Author of life, endures every suffering, and 
death itself; the Incarnate Lord, substituting himself 
for us miserable sinners, has taken in his hand the 
chalice presented by divine justice, and he drinks it to 
the dregs. 

Oh, how bitter is that chalice ! By what woes our 
divine Savior satisfies for us ! 

He suffers in his soul a mortal sadness, fear, weariness, 
grief, desolation, dejection, shame, confusion, all manner 
of anguish. 

He suffers in his body unheard-of pains. He is 
tightly bound — he is brutally dragged along — h e is slapped 
and buffeted — he is given up to the tortures of a horrible 
scourging which tears his members and makes his flesh 
fly in tatters ; then come the crowning with thorns — the 
carrying of the cross — the crucifixion — the elevation 
of the cross — the three hours' agony on that altar of his 
sacrifice. 

He suffers from all sorts of persons : his people disown 
him and demand his death : one of his apostles betrays 
him, another denies him, all desert him. For him, no 
pity, no compassion. Earth and hell are leagued against 
him. Heaven seems to abandon him, as he expresses 



4 ■ MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

it in these words : " My God, my God, why hast thou 
forsaken me ! "* 

It is, therefore, overwhelmed with innumerable pains 
and unheard-of sorrows that he presents himself to our 
contemplation. 

And now let us ask why he suffers so many ills, and 
seek the reason thereof in his divine heart which 
breathes only the glory of God his Father, and which is 
consumed with love for us. 

Jesus Christ suffers to glorify his heavenly Father 
and accomplish his will. " Sacrifice and oblation," says 
he, " thou didst not desire ; then I said : ' Behold, I 
come that I should do thy will.'"t When about to give 
himself up to his enemies, he tells his apostles: "But 
that the world may know that I love the Father, and as 
the Father hath given me commandment, so I do. Arise, 
let us go hence ! " % 

Jesus suffers in order to satisfy for the sins of all 
men : " He hath delivered himself for us," says St. Paid, 
" an oblation and a sacrifice to God, for an odor of 
sweetness :"§ " In him, we find, through his blood, 
the remission of sins :"|| David had said of the Savior : 
" With the Lord there is mercy, and with him plentiful 
redemption : and he shall redeem Israel from all his 
iniquities."^" 

Jesus Christ suffers that we may in return love him 
with all the love of Avhich we are capable ; and it is for 
this reason that, even though one tear of his would have 
sufficed for the expiation of all the sins of men, he was 

* St. Matt, xxvii. 46. t Ps. x'xxix. 7-9. \ St. John, xiv. 31. 
§ Eph. v. 2. || Col. i. 14. IT Ps. exxix. 7, 8. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. t) 

pleased to endure all sorts of pain and to die a most 
cruel death. 

Jesus suffers to cure men of the wounds made by sin, 
and to restore us to our former state. Our fall was 
occasioned by pride and disobedience ; our restoration 
can only be effected by our voluntary abasement and 
our entire submission to God. Now, it is to conduct us 
in this way of salvation that our Lord humbles himself 
so far that he can say : "I am a worm, and no man ; 
the reproach of men, and the outcast of the people :"* 
and that after having assumed the form of a slave, u he 
humbles himself, becoming obedient unto death, even 
the death of the cross." f 

He suffers to teach us patience, forgiveness of injuries, 
devotedness even to our enemies ; he suffers to give us 
a perfect example of all virtues, and to excite us to 
walk courageously in his footsteps ; he suffers to make 
us understand the great evil of sin, the cost of grace, 
the value of our soul. 

APPLICATION. 

Do we with our whole heart love Jesus, the divine 
victim of our redemption, who sacrifices himself for our 
sake ? 

The Son of God manifests himself to us torn with 
blows, crowned with thorns, bleeding, fastened to a 
cross, his eyes filled with tears ; and, in this state, he 
says to us : u My son, give me thy heart ! "$ Could 
we refuse it to him ? 

With the saints, let us compassionate his sufferings ; 

* Ps. xxi. 7. t Phil., ii. 8. J Prov., xxiii. 20. 



6 MEDITATIONS OX THE PASSION 

let us make his pains our own ; let us weep over him ; 
but, at the same time, let us, as he exhorts us to do, 
weep over our own sins which are the true cause of his 
Passion. 

Let us profit by the fruits of salvation which he pro- 
cured for us by his sacrifice ; let us labor to apply to 
ourselves his infinite merits. Let this be our whole 
ambition : the graces which flow from the cross, purify, 
console, strengthen, the soul, and prepare it to go to 
heaven to celebrate the eternal nuptials of the Lamb, 
who has secured that privilege for us by the shedding 
of his blood. 

PRAYER. 

O Jesus, who hast suffered so much for the love of 
us, deign, I beseech thee, to enlighten my mind and 
touch my heart, to the end that, in the contemplation 
of thy griefs, I may comprehend, with all thy saints, 
the length, the breadth, the height, the depth, of thy 
charity, and that my soul may pour itself forth in tears 
of love, of gratitude, and of repentance ! 

victim of my salvation, grant, by thy grace, that 
I may be united with thee in thy sufferings, to the end 
that I may be united with thee in thy glory ! Amen. 

(See Resumes, page 382.) 



OF OUE LORD JESUS CHRIST. 7 

SECOND MEDITATION. 

JESUS REPAIRS FROM THE SUPPER-ROOM TO 
THE GARDEN OF OLIVES. 



■Jesus went forth with his disciples, over the brook Cedron." 
— St. John, xviii. 1. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us contemplate our adorable Savior at the 
moment when he has celebrated the Last Supper with his 
apostles. He has immolated and eaten with them the last 
figurative paschal lamb; he has established the sacrifice 
of the altar, and said, presenting to his apostles the 
consecrated bread and wine : " This is my body which 
shall be delivered for you : "* " This is my blood which 
shall be shed for you."f 

And now the hour is come when the true paschal 
lamb is to be immolated, when the sacrifice of the cross 
is to be accomplished ; — that sacrifice of which that 
of the altar shall be commemorative, and the continua- 
tion, when that adorable body which is the host of our 
salvation is to be given up, and that divine blood shed, 
by which alone the remission of sins can be obtained. 

The night commenced is that on which Jesus Christ 
is going to leave the powers of darkness full liberty. 
His enemies are on the watch and desirous of seizing 
* 1 Cor. xi. 24. f St. Matt. xxvi. 28. 



8 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

him ; the infamous Judas is with them, awaiting the 
favorable moment for giving him up to them. 

But let us turn our eyes from the traitor. Let us 
behold the eleven faithful apostles, penetrated with the 
liveliest emotion on account of the supper of the New 
Law, of which they have partaken, and pressing around 
their divine Master. With what respect, what love, 
what piety, they hear the words of life and of charity 
which fall from his divine lips ! 

•• What is written/' said he, " must be fulfilled in me : 
'He was reputed with the wicked;'* for what concerns 
me relates to its accomplishment. Let not your heart 
be troubled. ... In my Father's house there are 
many mansions ; I go to prepare a place for you. . . . 
I will come again and will take you to myself, that 
where I am you also may be. 

" If you love me. keep my commandments ; and I 
will ask the Father, and he shall give you another 
paraclete, the Spirit of Truth. I will not leave you 
orphans ; I will come to you. The world seeth me no 
more ; but you see me. 

" My peace I give to you. I go away, and I come 
again to you. For the prince of the world cometh. 
And in me he hath not anything ; but that the world 
may know that I love the Father, and as the Father 
hath given me commandment so I do. Arise, let us go 
hence." t 

After these words, he journeys towards the brook 
Cedron, which separates Jerusalem from the Mount of 
Olives ; and continuing to instruct his apostles, he says 
* Isa. liii. 12. + St. John. xiv. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 9 

to them : " This is my commandment, that you love 
one another as I have loved you. Greater love than 
this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his 
friends. You are my friends if you do the things that 
I command you. These things I command you, that 
you love one another."* 

He tells them again that he is going to leave them, 



teach them all truth ; he exhorts them to pray, assuring 
them that whatsoever they ask in his name, his Father 
will. give them; he announces to them that they shall 
have much to suffer in the world: "But have confi- 
dence," he adds, " I have overcome the world."f 

Then he prays for them and for all those who shall 
believe in their word. Raising his eyes to heaven, he 
says : " Father, I pray for them whom thou hast given 
me. Keep them in thy name, that they may be one 
as we also are one. Preserve them from evil. Sanctify 
them in truth. Father, I will that where I am, they 
also whom thou hast given me may be with me, that 
they may see my glory which thou hast given me. I 
have made known thy name to them, that the love 
wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them, and I 
in them."J 

His prayer finished, he leaves the place where he 
was, and goes forth from Jerusalem. Then, and by 
that very going forth, commences the execution of the 
decree of reprobation pronounced against that ungrate- 
ful city, which is soon to be deicidal. She has not 

* St. John, xv. t St. John, xvi. 33. 

I St. John, xvii. 



10 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

availed herself of the days that might procure for her 
peace, and now these days of mercy are past. 

Jesus arrives at the Valley of Jehoshaphat. As 
prefigured by David flying from the parricide Absalom, 
he crosses the torrent of Cedron, his soul overwhelmed 
with sadness. Let us contemplate him dejected, 
desolate ; but let us remember that he will one day 
come again in power and in glory in that same valley, 
where all men shall then be gathered together. 

Nevertheless, Jesus approaches the garden which is 
to be the first scene of his sorrows. But, as he has to 
sustain alone the coming contest, he first separates him- 
self from eight of his apostles, then from the three 
others. 

Oh ! how sensibly his tender heart feels this separa- 
tion ! And his disciples, too, — with what sorrowful 
emotion they behold him going away from them, enter- 
ing the garden, and disappearing amongst the trees ! 

At length the journey from the supper-room to the 
Garden of Olives is ended. Jesus is about to commence 
his Passion on the very mountain from which he is to 
ascend into heaven, teaching us thereby that it is by 
trials and troubles we are to gain eternal bliss ; that we 
must, like him, pass through the garden of sorrow and 
through Calvary before arriving at the glory of the 
Ascension. 

Jesus is about to commence his passion in a garden, 
and, by that circumstance, he reveals to us that he 
came to repair the evil which began in a garden, and 
which was caused by the disobedience of the first man ; 
he announces to us that he advances to disarm the cherub 



OP OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 11 

placed by divine justice at the gate of the true paradise, 
and to take from his hands the flaming sword which 
debars us from entering in. 

Ah ! let us think of the difference that exists between 
the garden wherein the first man was placed, and that 
in which we contemplate the new man. 

There, Adam enjoyed all sorts of delights ; here, 
Jesus is going to suffer in his soul all manner of woes. 

There, the first sin was committed, and, consequently, 
innumerable evils overspread the earth ; here, sin is 
repaired, and hence flow such infinite graces that the 
Church can exclaim : " happy transgression which 
procured for us such a Redeemer ! " 

There, Death was born of pride and pleasure ; here, 
Jesus by his sufferings and his humiliation, causes us to 
be born again to a new life. 

There, was the tree of knowledge of good and evil, 
which has been the origin of all wars and of all disorders ; 
here, is the olive, the symbol of the peace which Jesus 
has procured for us by his sweat and his blood. 

APPLICATION. 

How fruitful in salutary teachings is the subject on 
which we meditate ! 

It makes us understand the misfortune of the soul 
which, like Judas, is the slave of a' passion, and separ- 
ates itself from its divine Master ; or which, like 
Jerusalem, knows not the day when that adorable 
Savior visits it by his grace ! 

It admirably instructs us in the love, the tenderness, 
the generosity, of Jesus Christ for us. It makes us 



12 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

contemplate, as it were unveiled, his heart consumed 
with the flames of charity. 

Oh ! could Ave but conceive the love of that divine 
Savior for us, who, after having given himself to us in 
his sacrament, substituted himself in our place to suffer 
the penalty of our sins. 

He has said: "Greater love than this no man hath, 
that a man lay down his life for his friends : " * now this 
proof he has given us. and that too when we were his 
enemies. 

Why, then, should we not love him with our whole 
heart 1 Why not manifest to him by all our thoughts, 
by all our affections, by all our works, the liveliest and 
most constant gratitude, since that gratitude, how great 
soever it may be, will never be commensurate with 
what he has done for us. 

PRAYER. 

I adore thee, O Jesus! beginning thy dolorous 
Passion. I have accompanied thee from the supper- 
room to the Mount of Olives, listening, with thy 
apostles, to the words of life and of charity which pro- 
ceed from thine adorable mouth. Oh ! grant by thy 
grace, that they may be the rule of my life, to the end 
that having faithfully accomplished thy holy will, I 
may deserve to be placed on thy right hand, when thou 
shalt come, glorious and triumphant, to judge the 
nations in the same Valley of Jehoshaphat, which has 
witnessed thy humiliations ! 

(See Resumes, page 382.) 
* St. John. xv. 13. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 13 

THIRD MEDITATION. 
SADNESS OF JESUS IN THE GARDEN OF OLIVES. 



"My soul is sorrowful, even unto death." — St. Matt., xxvi. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us adore our Divine Savior entering into the 
Garden of Olives, with Peter, James, and John, the three 
disciples whom he wishes to make more particularly 
the witnesses of the piteous state to which he is 
reduced. 

He experiences fear, sadness, and great affliction 
which he expresses in these words : " My soul is 
sorrowful, even unto death."* 

Wishing to prepare for his passion by prayer, he 
tells the disciples who accompany him to watch and 
pray ; then he goes some paces away from them. 

Contemplate him in the state in which the holy 
Evangelist describes him : he is overcome with fear 
and trouble ; he suffers the greatest interior pains, the 
most overwhelming sadness, the most fearful anxiety ; 
he feels in his divine heart the incomprehensible sorrows 
whereof the prophet-king speaks when he exclaimed 
by divine inspiration : " My heart is troubled within 
me, and darkness hath covered me."t 

See, O my soul ! thy divine Savior sinking under the 
weight of his sorrows ; he is become pale, weak, trem- 
* St. Matt., xxvi. 38. + Ps. liv. 5, 6. 



14 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

bling ; his heart is oppressed with anguish, his eyes are 
full of tears, his soul is plunged in the bitterest grief. 
Hear the groans of thy beloved, and abandon thyself to 
sentiments of the liveliest compassion. 

O Jesus, how profound is thy sorrow ! but how 
mysterious, how astounding it also is ! It is only a few 
moments since, showing thy desire to suffer and to die 
for us, thou saidst : " I have a baptism wherewith I am 
to be baptized, and how am I straitened until it be 
accomplished! "* And behold all at once thou showest 
thyself timid, dismayed, overcome with weariness, and 
revealest to us that thy soul is sorrowful oven unto 
death. 

Why, then, O Lord ! art thou, the joy and the delight 
of the angels, ingulfed in afflictions ? Wherefore dost 
thou, the source of all strength, appear weakness itself? 
Wherefore does he who is to be the courage of martyrs, 
shudder at the sight of torments and the approach of 
death ! 

Ah ! undoubtedly in all this there are sublime teach- 
ings, whereon we should meditate attentively. 

The exhaustion that Jesus feels is extreme ; but it is, 
at the same time, voluntary. He produces it in his soul, 
in order to show us that he has truly taken our nature, 
and that, apart from sin, there is really in him what there 
is in us. He wills only what his Father wills : neverthe- 
less, his submission, perfect as it is, diminishes not in him 
the feeling of horror, nor his repugnance for the tor- 
ments and the ignominious death he is to undergo. At 
this moment, the Divinity, which is always in his 
* St. Luke. xii. ."SO. 



OF OUR LOED JESUS CHRIST. 15 

• 

adorable person, leaves his sacred humanity, in some 
degree, to itself, in order that he may experience all 
our sorrows 5 but at the same time it sustains it, that it 
may not give way before the moment he has himself 
appointed. 

More than that, as remarks St. Lawrence Justinian, 
his divinity itself contributes to augment his sufferings, 
by giving his soul a perfect knowledge of all he has to 
endure. 

This is, in fact, the first cause of his utter prostration. 
He considers the bitterness of the chalice presented to 
him by divine justice, which he must satisfy for us. He 
sees distinctly all he is to suffer ; he unrolls before his 
imagination the pictures of all the ignominy that awaits 
him, of all the horrible torments that are prepared for 
him. He represents to himself that every moment of 
that night and of the succeeding day, will bring him 
new opprobrium ; that he shall be the butt of all man- 
ner of insults, outraged in every possible way, left a 
prey to the most cruel tortures, even to the final moment 
when he shall expire after having said, u All is con- 
summated ! "* Before the sight his heart quails, his 
courage seems to abandon him, and his soul is over- 
come with mortal fear. 

But it is not only the sight of the torments prepared 
for him that affects our divine Savior ; it is still more 
the sight of the sins which he has taken upon himself, 
and that of the vast number of souls who will not profit 
by his sacrifice. 

He is overwhelmed with sorrow, because he sees him- 
* St. John, xix. 30. 



16 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

self lade 1 :, before his Father, with the sins of all men. 
Oil ! who will give us to know what shame, what con- 
fusion he feels when he considers himself in that state ! 
He is the thrice holy God, and he appears guilty of all 
the sins that have been committed or shall be committed 
on earth during the lapse of ages ! Hence, at this 
moment, he has nothing before his mind but what is sad 
and painful : he sees in the past an innumerable suc- 
cession of crimes, from the disobedience of .Adam till the 
sacrilege of Judas ; the present bears heavily on his soul 
with the -weight of the t~ t i 1 1 greater crimes already resolved 
on by the chiefs of the Jewish nation ; he perceives in 
the future the work of sin going on without interruption, 
and that in despite of the sacrifice of his life made to 
destroy it. 

He is overwhelmed with sadness, because he considers 
the ingratitude and the misfortune of sinners' who will 
refuse to profit by his sufferings and his death ; who will 
despise the salvation he has purchased for them; who 
still persist in their iniquity, and shall die impenitent. 
It is for them, for their unhappy lot, that he sheds abun- 
dant tears. His heart is broken to think of how many 
Christians, members of his mystical body, who shall be 
snatched away from it by demons ! 

But there are other motives still which cause this 
interior sorrow of Jesus. " It is," says St. Ambrose, 
" in order to expiate our guilty joys, and merit for us 
the grace never again to give ourselves up to them." 
It is to sanctify our sorrow, to give us strength and courage 
to bear them, to soften them, and even sometimes to 
exempt Us from them. It is that we may find in him a 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 17 

remedy for our moral pains, a source of consolation in 
our dryness and discouragement. It is also in order to 
inspire us with the sorrow, the contrition we ought to 
have on account of our transgressions. Sins originate 
in the heart 5 Jesus begins expiation for them by an 
interior sorrow, and thereby merits for all of us regret for 
those we have committed, and the grace to expiate them 
by a true repentance. 

APPLICATION. 

To enter into the spirit of this mystery of the sorrow 
of Jesus in the Garden of Olives, let us excite in our 
hearts the most lively gratitude to our generous 
Redeemer, and the most sincere repentance for our 
faults. Ah ! let us never forget that it is our sins that 
have overwhelmed his divine soul with grief, that it was 
on our account his face was covered with confusion, 
that it was at the sight of our malice his eyes were 
filled with tears. Let us then weep in his presence the 
misfortune we have had in offending him, and let our 
tears have their source in our heart, truly contrite and 
humble ! 

Let the thought of the sorrow of Jesus excite us also 
to patience and resignation in our interior troubles, and 
let it fortify us against the weariness and discourage- 
ment we might feel. 

When we are afflicted, let us unite ourselves to Jesus 
suffering, and ask him, by the event of his divine sad- 
ness, the grace to bear with constancy and with gener- 
osity the trials to which he subjects us. 

Let us purify our hearts from nil irregular affection ; 



18 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

let us reform the interior man within us on the model of 
Jesus Christ. Let us try to impress on ourselves the 
sadness of that divine Master, not allowing ourselves 
to go the length of a joy that is wholly worldly, hut 
living in a modesty and a reserve that may manifest 
the compunction which ought to reign in our hearts. 

PRAYER. 

" O Lord Jesus Christ ! eternal sweetness of those who 
love thee, remember the mournful sadness thou didst 
feel at the approach of thy passion, and by that sadness, 
most sweet Jesus, have mercy, I beseech thee, on 
me a sinner ! " :: " 

Grant me that I may weep to my last hour the mis- 
fortune I have had in offending thee, and reward, by 
the generous practice of virtue, the unfaithfulness of 
which I am guilty, and which I will deplore to the end 
of my life. 

(See Resumes, page 383.) 



* Prayer of St. Gertrude. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 19 

FOURTH MEDITATION. 
PRAYER OF JESUS IN THE GARDEN OF OLIVES, 



Father . . . take away this chalice from me. 
St. Mark, xiv. 36. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us contemplate in the Garden of Olives our ador- 
able Savior suffering in his divine soul the most over- 
whelming weariness, the most lively apprehension, the 
most profound sadness. 

Ah ! who could measure the extent of his grief? Let 
us hear him manifest it to his apostles by the astonish- 
ing words : " My soul is sorrowful even unto death ! "* 
His heart is desolate, and he feels the want of having 
recourse to his heavenly Father, to draw from prayer 
strength against the exhaustion into which he allows 
his sacred humanity to fall. 

After having admonished the three apostles who 
accompany him, to watch and pray with him, he goes 
a stone's throw away from them, and there, falling pro- 
strate on the ground, he says : " Father ! all things are 
possible to thee ; take away this chalice from me ; but 
not as I will, but as thou wilt."t 

Ah ! who is it that is reduced to this state of desola- 
tion, and who prays with such earnest entreaty ? It is 
the Almighty, it is the well-beloved Son of God. 
* St. Matt., xiv. 34. t Tbid., 86. 



20 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

What a mystery, then, is that of his agonizing grief, 
and the sighs and moans in which he gives vent to it ! 

He considers himself charged with the sins of all men, 
and consequently indebted to his Father's justice for the 
penalty of that all but infinite number of faults and 
crimes of every kind. 

Hence, the chalice which he asks to have taken away, 
is our sins, the burden of which he wants through love 
for us to take upon himself, but which is infinitely 
repugnant to Lis sanctity. 

This chalice is all that he has to suffer in his grievous 
Passion ; it is the deluge of afflictions that is to break 
over him, and which is to end in the most cruel and 
ignominious death ; it is the profanation which his 
enemies are to make of his adorable person, which they 
will overwhelm with all manner of contempt ; it is the 
deicide whereof the Jews are to become guilty, and 
which shall draw down upon them the numberless mis- 
fortunes that will be the ruin of their nation. 

This chalice is, moreover, the abuse that will be 
made by men of the graces he is about to merit for 
them at the cost of so many sorrows ; it is the loss of 
the great number of soids who will cast themselves into 
the abyss of hell, notwithstanding what he does to save 
them. 

All this is present to his mind and breaks his heart 
Hence he asks for its removal " by prayers and sup- 
plications, by a strong cry and tears."* Undoubtedly, 
Jesus ! it were just that thy Father should hear thy 
prayer. Innocence, or rather holiness itself, thou 
* Heh., v. 7. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 21 

shouldst not be subjected to the sorrow and death which 
are the penalty of sin ; naturally, thy sacred humanity 
should neither suffer nor die. But if he hears thee, if 
thy chalice is removed from thee, what is to become of 
us? — of us who can only be saved on condition that 
thou wilt accept it, for thou alone canst be the victim of 
our redemption. 

Oh ! let us have confidence : mercy prevails here 
over justice ; Jesus desires to be now and always our 
generous liberator ; so having said, " Father ! take away 
this chalice from me," he immediately adds : u but not 
as I will, but as thou wilt." 

Let us reflect on this second part of his prayer: — 

" Father, not as I will, but as thou wilt." — Thus 
Jesus commences his Passion by the self-denial of 
which he had given the precept when he said: "If 
any man will come after me let him deny himself, 
and take up his cross and follow me ! " * He gives 
up his human will, although most holy, and com- 
pels it to accept torments without number, and an 
infamous death from which it would naturally have 
shrunk. 

" Father, not as I will, but as thou wilt:" I submit 
to thy decrees. " Burnt-offering and sin-offering thou 
didst not require : then said I, i Behold, I come ; in the 
head of the book it is written of me, that I should do 
thy will. ' " t Yes, O Father ! to repair the disobedience 
of man, I make myself obedient even unto death, and 
the death of the cross ; I accept the chalice which thou 
dost present to me ; I consent to be baptized with the 
* St. Matt., xvi. 24. t Ps. xxxix. 8, 9. 



22 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

baptism wherewith I am to be baptized ; may thy holy 
will, not mine, be done ! 

O sublime obedience of Jesus ! By it he adores God 
in a manner worthy of him ; by it he repairs the dis- 
obedience of Adam and of each one of us ; by it he merits 
for us the grace to submit our own will, on all occasions? 
to the divine will ; to lead, in our holy state, the life of 
obedience to which we are called. 

Thus it is that, in his prayer, our divine Savior 
reveals to us the admirable dispositions of his heart, and 
teaches us the renouncement of our own will, and perfect 
submission to that of God. Thus it is, again, that he 
instructs us by his example in the qualities which the 
prayer of Christians ought to have ; for he prays with 
humility, holding himself, as it were, annihilated in the 
presence of his Father ; with fervor, asking earnestly to 
be exempted from the sufferings of his Passion ; with 
resignation, asking it only with perfect submission to 
the will of God ; with constancy, repeating the same 
words and prolonging his prayer, although his soul is 
in a state of utter and extreme desolation, and that it 
appears to him as though God, his Father, had entirely 
forsaken him. _ 

APPLICATION. 

Let us compassionate the interior sorrow of Jesus ; 
let us take part in the grief that overwhelms him, and 
with him shed tears before God, his Father. 

His sorrow is caused by sin ; and we, alas ! have 
committed it so many times, and with such aggravating 
circumstances ! Besides, we see it committed so fre- 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 23 

quently, so universally : ah ! do we not feel in our 
heart, at that sight, a bitter pain, a profound desolation ? 

With Jesus, let us weep over the misfortune of souls 
who profit not by the redemption he has purchased for 
them by his sufferings and death. Oh ! how deplorable 
is that misfortune ! 

Let us pray that the number of these souls may 
diminish : let us pray for the conversion of sinners ; 
let us pray that the merits of the Divine Redeemer 
may not be left unfruitful by reason of the malice or 
indifference of men. 

In imitation of our divine Master, let us renounce our 
own will to submit ourselves in all things to that of God. 

Let us be always heartily disposed to say : " Our 
Father who art in heaven ! may thy holy will be done 
by me on earth, as it is done by thy holy angels in 
heaven, or rather as it was by thy divine Son who, to 
accomplish it, made himself obedient even unto death, 
and the death of the cross." 

Let us ask of Jesus Christ praying in the Garden of 
Olives, the spirit of prayer and the courage to accept 
the portion of the chalice which is presented to us, and 
by which we shall apply to ourselves the merits of his 
sacrifice. 

PRAYER. 

most sweet Jesus ! who art come to seek and to 
save what had perished, I compassionate, from the depth 
of my heart, the desolation to which thou art reduced. 

beloved of my soul ! I wish to give myself entirely 
to thee : and in order to testify to thee my love and my 



24 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

gratitude, I offer thee my heart to suffer as much of the 
bitterness of thine as thou wilt deem fitting for me to 
bear. 

But deign, I beseech thee, to aid me with thy grace, 
so that my courage may not fail ; for alas ! I am weak- 
ness itself, and at sight of the obstacles which present 
themselves, I can only exclaim : " Father ! take this 
chalice away from me." Grant therefore, I beseech 
thee, that I may be able to add, after thy example, 
and in all my trials. " Father, not my will be done, 
but thine ! " 

(See Restmes, page 383.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 25 

FIFTH MEDITATION. 
JESUS SWEATS BLOOD AND WATER, 



Being in an agony, he prayed the longer, and his sweat became 
as drops of blood trickling down upon the ground." — 
St. Luke, xxii. 43, 44. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us contemplate in the Garden of Olives, our 
divine Savior prolonging his prayer. Let us behold 
him, overwhelmed with sadness, and recall the prin- 
cipal causes of the state of desolation to which he is 
reduced. 

He considers the sufferings that await him. He has 
before his mind the chains that shall bind his hands, the 
lashes that shall tear his members, the thorns that shall 
pierce his head ; the nails, the cross, the spear, — all the 
instruments of his torture. 

He measures how deep a wound his sufferings shall 
make in the heart of his most holy Mother. 

He counts all the woes wherewith Jerusalem shall be 
overwhelmed in punishment of the deicide she is about 
to commit. 

Having taken our iniquities upon him, he sees him- 
self, as it were, all defiled with all the crimes of mankind. 
Oh ! what a subject of confusion for his most holy soul, 
which perfectly comprehends how hideous, how hateful, 
how revolting sin is. 



26 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

" men ! who conceive not what injury sin doth to 
God," exclaims St. Chrysostom, " come, hasten to be- 
hold Christ, the anointed of the Lord, the Son of God, 
God himself, prostrate in the dust. What is it that has 
reduced him to that state ?— Sin, and even the mere 
image of sin. ... Oh ! it is that he has seen to what 
a degree sin offends.God, and degrades man ; and how 
it was necessary for him to carry satisfaction in order to 
appease the one and reinstate the other." 

St. Paul says : " Him who knew no sin, he hath 
made sin for us, that we might be made the justice 
of God in him !"* The adorable Savior regards with 
a voluntary shudder all the rigor of divine justice pro- 
voked by the iniquities of men, and to be executed 
wholly on him as the substitute of sinners. 

Above all, he considers the number, alas ! so great, 
of those who will trample on his blood, and for whom 
his sufferings and death shall be the cause of a terrible 
condemnation. Oh, how the sight of those wretches 
afflicts his divine heart ! How urgently he beseeches his 
Father to remove this chalice from him. to grant, if it 
be possible, that all men may profit by the redemption 
he is going to work out ! 

" The Son of God, about to commence his passion," 
says St. Catharine of Sienna, "seeing impenitent 
sinners deprived through their malice of the fruit of his 
cross, falls into such a profound sadness and such 
grievous agony, that he sweats water and blood." 

Then an angel coming down to him, consoles and 
strengthens him. Ah! doubtless, the celestial mes- 
* 2 Cor., v. 21. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CIIRIST. 27 

senger represents to him the saving fruits of the sacri- 
fice about to be accomplished ; — sin expiated, hell van- 
quished, heaven opened, God glorified in time and in 
eternity; — doubtless, he shows him all mankind, beseech- 
ing him to have pity on them, and save them! 

Jesus through humility accepts the services of the 
angel ; but he will not have him alleviate his agony ; 
he continues to regard the sufferings which await him, 
the number and enormity of the sins he has taken upon 
him, the multitude of souls who will voluntarily be lost, 
notwithstanding what he is going to suffer in order to 
redeem them. 

The pain he feels is so great that his heart contracts, 
and his blood accumulates in his chest. But, making an 
effort over himself, he surmounts all the repugnance he 
has allowed himself to feel ; and by that effort, his blood, 
violently impelled, rushes out through all his pores and 
forms a sweat that penetrates his garments, streams to 
the ground, and reddens it all around him. 

Ah ! let us ask why that effusion of the divine blood 
took place ? Let us say to Jesus : " Why then is thy 
apparel red"* as scarlet and dyed with thy blood? 
It is neither the lashes, nor the nails, nor the spear 
that draw it from thy veins ; why then does it flow ? 

Ali ! I understand : it is to testify to men that thou 
givest freely, and of thyself, thy life to save them 5 that 
thy love for them is boundless, that thou desirest noth- 
ing more than to be baptized with the baptism Avherewith 
thou art to be baptized. It is to give hope of pardon to 
those who are going to put thee to death, and who, not 
* Isa., lxiii. 2. 



28 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

daring to ask it by the blood they will have shed on 
Calvary or in the pretorium, can always ask it through 
that which thou hast shed here by thyself ; it is to repair 
the sin committed in the garden of delights, and which, 
in fact, is fully repaired by the effusion of thy blood in this 
garden of sorrows. 

divine blood! thou art a salutary rain falling in bene- 
diction on the sterile earth four thousand years accursed ; 
thou art an eloquent voice which ascends to heaven only 
to ask for grace ; thou art the more than sufficient price 
of the ransom of all mankind ! 

Jesus, generous Redeemer! thou who substitutest 
thyself for us to suffer the punishment that we have 
deserved ; thou makest contract so to do and signest it 
with thy blood ! At this moment, thou receivest from 
thy Father the warrant of our condemnation, to annul it 
by fastening it with thee to the Cross ! 

Jesus is the high priest of the New Law; he comes 
to purify us, "not in water only, but in water and 
blood ; "* that mysterious sweat that we contemplate, is 
truly the aspersion made on the people by the high 
priest,-when going up to the altar of holocaust; it is 
more still : it is the beginning of his sacrifice who is at 
once friend and victim, and by whom only the remis- 
sion of sins can be obtained. 

APPLICATION. 

Let us not forget that the kingdom of heaven suffers 
violence, and the violent only bear it away : "t yes, there 
are none crowned but those who, like Jesus in the garden 
* 1 St, John, v. 6. t St. Matt.,, xi. 12. 



OF OUR LOED JESUS CHRIST. 29 

of Gethseniane, arm themselves with courage to accom- 
plish the will of God, even by the sacrifice of nature. 

Let us pray for grace to overcome our repugnance. 
Let us be on all occasions courageous against ourselves. 
What is the combat we have to sustain, compared with 
that which Jesus sustained for our sake ? Let us often 
recall his agony in the garden of Olives, and, as St. 
Paul exhorts us, let us consider that we have not yet 
" resisted into blood i "* 

Let us contemplate, hy the interior sufferings of 
Jesus, even after the angel's visit, that very often the 
presence of grace does not lessen the sense of our sor- 
rows ; that, usually, it really acts in us and strengthens 
us, but without any sensible manifestation of itself; 
that we may have strength to do good without having 
the taste for it, and that, consequently, we ought to 
remain firm in the service of God even though we feel 
neither sweetness in it nor affection for it. 

Let us often think that it is because we have "had the 
misfortune of sinning, that Jesus was overcome with 
sorrow, reduced to agony ; that it was our crimes that 
brought on that painful sweat that would have been 
death to him, if, through charity for us, he had not 
chosen to reserve himself for new torments. 

Ah ! let us cast ourselves at his feet and ask pardon 



divine blood which is the price of our ransom; let us 

respectfully gather up a little, that it may impart to 

US the grace of our reconciliation, and the sentiments 

* Heb.. xii. 4. 



30 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

wherewith the adorable victim of our redemption was 
animated. 

PRAYER. 
O most tender Master ! what claims thou hast on my 
gratitude and love ! Ah ! must not these sentiments, as 
well as regret for my faults, penetrate my soul at the 
contemplation of thy agony and bloody sweat ! Oh ! 
let me cast myself at thy feet, and bathe with my tears 
the earth thou hast bathed with thy blood ; permit me 
to tell thee that I hope in thy mercy, and that I found 
my hope on the infinite charity which made thee accept, 
notwithstanding the repugnance of thy nature, the 
grievous part of victim for my salvation. 

(See Resumes, page 384.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 81 

SIXTH MEDITATION 
THE SLEEP OF THE APOSTLES, 



; Could you uot watch oue hour with uie ? Watch ye, and 
pray."— St. Matt., xxvi. 40, 41. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Jesus, before entering into the garden of Olives, had 
told his disciples to watch and pray, so that they might 
not give way to the temptation to which his sufferings 
were to expose them. Speaking afterwards to Peter 
and the two sons of Zebedee, who had entered the 
garden with him, he repeats the same injunction : 
u My soul is sorrowful even unto death, " said he ; 
" stay you here and watch with me." 

Then he goes away a stone's throw from them, and 
begins to pray. 

What motives the apostles have to watch and pray ! 
Jesus, their divine Master, prescribes it ; he has warned 
them that they are going to be tried ; that the shepherd 
shall be stricken, and the sheep of the flock dispersed ; 
they behold himself preparing for his passion by prayer 
the most humble, the most persevering ; they know 
what interior sorrow overwhelms him ; they hear his 
sighs and groans. 

And yet, as though despising his warning, and dis- 
regarding his sad state, they give way to sleep. 0, 
criminal indifference ! the enemy is watching for the 



32 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

opportunity to surprise them, and they do not keep on 
their guard, they are weak, and seek not in prayer, 
which is its source, the strength of which they have 
need. Jesus suffers, and they do not compassionate his 
pains. He prays for them ; and they do not pray with 
him. What pain must his heart feel ! Lo ! he interrupts 
his prayer to come to them. 

Comforter of the afflicted, he feels the want of being 
comforted ; strength of the weak, he seeks himself a 
support ; or rather vigilant and charitable Shepherd, he 
comes to his sheep to guard and preserve them from 
the danger that threatens them. 

He draws near to the apostles, and addressing himself 
to him whom he has made their chief; " What !" says 
he, " could you not watch one hour with me ". " 

Speaking to them all, he adds : " Watch ye and 
pray, that ye enter not into temptation ; for the spirit, 
indeed, is willing, but the flesh is weak." 

Ah! this is truly the language of divine wisdom. 
What precious teachings do these words contain ! 

They remind us, in an admirable manner, of human 
weakness, of our promptness in forming good resolu- 
tions and our weakness in accomplishing them, of the 
war of the spirit against the flesh, and of the flesh 
against the spirit, of the danger in which we constantly 
are of offending God, of the necessity of self-distrust, 
of watchfulness and of prayer : — behold what salutary 
lessons are given us by the divine Master, and by which 
alas ! we pi oiit so little ! 

Having thus renewed his recommendations, Jesus 
returns to his prayer, but soon shall he interrupt it 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 3o 

again. unexampled goodness and tenderness ! Jesus 
receives no consolation ; he is, so to say, abandoned by 
heaven and earth ; and in this state, he is occupied 
with his apostles and disciples; he seems to think only 
of them. For the second time, he returns to his apostles, 
but as before, he finds them asleep ; how his heart is 
saddened ! . . . Nevertheless, he reproaches them 
not. He regards them with compassion ; on their 
account, he groans over the frailty of man, alas ! so 
great ever since the day of the first sin ; and he, a third 
time, goes aside to pray. 

He asks in this third prayer that which he had 
already asked, that the chalice of his passion might be 
removed from him ; but doubtless he asks again that the 
faith of Simon Peter may not fail, and that the other 
disciples may be confirmed by him whom he has chosen 
for the head of his Church ; he prays also for us who, 
like the apostles, share so little in his sufferings, and he 
pleads our cause with his Father. 

Let us admire the infinite charity of our Savior, who 
takes our infirmities upon him and supplies, in one sense, 
for our inability to watch and pray : — he watches and 
prays, in order to obtain saving grace even for the 
souls who are not actually in the disposition of doing 
violence to themselves to practise virtue. Hence, when 
he returns a third time to his disciples, he no longer 
recommends vigilance to them ; he confines himself to 
saying, with sentiments of immense charity, " Sleep 
now, and take your rest ; " words which may signify — 
" Have confidence, I have obtained that you may profit 
by the fruits of my passion and death, not with- 



34 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

standing the little part you take in my sorrows : rest 
on me." 

Nevertheless, as it is not possible for man to be saved 
without some participation in the sorrows of Jesus, that 
merciful Master urges them to make an effort over them- 
selves : " Arise," he says to them, " let us go, for behold 
he is at hand who is to betray me ; " now it is that you 
must prove, by your courage and fidelity, that you are 
really my disciples. 

APPLICATION. 

To us religious is specially addressed the Savior's 
exhortation, " watch and pray." Ah ! let us ask our- 
selves whether we are faithful to it. 

Do we distrust ourselves I Are we conscious of our 
weakness ? Do we know what risks we run, and do 
we endeavor to avoid them ? Do we watch over our 
thoughts sometimes so vain, our imagination so extrava- 
gant, on our senses so inclined to evil and by which the 
soul receives such deep wounds ? Do we watch over 
the weak spot in our heart so as to forestall the enemy, 
and prevent him from entering in and taking possession 
of it? 

Do we watch in company with Jesus during medita- 
tion ? Are we not in that state of indifference so pain- 
ful to his tender heart ? Do we not become weary some- 
times in his holy presence, in the very moments when he 
calls us to watch and pray with him ? Do we not allow 
ourselves to fall into the sleep of tepidity ? 

Ah ! if so, let us listen to the divine Master telling 
us : " What ! you sleep instead of praying ; you sleep 



OF OUR LOKD JESUS CHRIST. 35 

instead of combating the enemies of your salvation ; 
you sleep instead of working seriously at your sanctifica- 
tion ; you sleep instead of thinking of me, instead 
of meditating on the sufferings I endure for you ; you 
cannot watch with me. Ah ! know you not, then, how 
great an evil it is for you to allow yourself to fall into 
negligence, into voluntary distractions during prayer, 
into that spiritual apathy which revolts my heart 1 

Let us deplore our criminal conduct, but let us not 
be discouraged : Jesus prayed to merit for us the grace 
of a return to fervor ; let us give ear to his words ! 
" Arise," he says, awake from thy sleep and follow me ; 
I am going to enter on the career you ought to follow in 
order to gain eternal glory ; .remember that those only 
shall prevail over their enemies who shall watch and 
pray with me. 

Let us watch, then, and pray unceasingly in union 
with him if we wish to obtain salvation. 

PRAYER. 

Jesus ! behold how long I have remained sunk in 
the guilty sleep of indifference and tepidity ; a torpor 
which I cannot explain to myself, benumbs my soul and 
paralyzes my will; I feel that in me the flesh is weak 
and prone to evil, and that the spirit, although quick 
in resolving, has not the strength to resist energetically 
by the practice of mortification : ah ! could I still remain 
in this state ? 

What then, is it for me that thou sufferest incon- 
ceivable pains, and for me thou givest thyself up % 
I cannot even think some moments on thy sufferings ! 



36 .MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

and perhaps at the end of the meditation I now 
commence, I may have deserved that thou reproach me 
with not having been able to watch one little hour with 
thee ! 

Have pity on my weakness and come to my aid, O 
beloved of my soul ! draw me from this deplorable 
lethargy ; say unto me, "Arise let us go ; " but say it with 
that potent voice which effects what it expresses, and I 
will give myself up, and fidl of fervor, I will accom- 
pany thee in the way wherein thou woiddst have me 
walk ! 

(See Resumes, page 384.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 37 

SEVENTH MEDITATION. 
COURAGE OF JESUS AFTER HIS PRAYER. 



Eise up, let us go." — St. Mark, xiv. 42. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us consider our Divine Savior ending his long 
and painful prayer, and quitting the place he had wet 
with his tears and his blood : he has prepared himself 
by prayer for the consummation of his sacrifice. The 
moment is come when, to the pains of the heart, must 
be added the pains of the body, and that moment he 
now regards without fear, without sadness. 

By his divine spirit from which nought can be hidden, 
he sees advancing the- soldiers and servants who are 
going to lay their sacrilegious hands upon him ; he 
perceives through the trees of the garden the torches 
that light their way ; he hears their blasphemies and 
their death-cries ; ne distinguishes at their head the 
infamous disciple who has just betrayed him. He knows 
what torments await him. He sees the cords that are 
to bind his hands, the bandage that is to cover his eyes, 
the scourges that are to lacerate his members, the crown 
that shall pierce his brow, the nails that shall pierce his 
hands and feet, the cross on which he shall suffer a death 
of infamy. He knows, too, that his disciples are on the 
point of deserting him and taking flight. 



38 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

Nevertheless, he shows no farther apprehension. It 
is but a moment since he was dejected, plunged in sad- 
ness, reduced to agony, and now he is courageous and 
full of strength ; he accepts without hesitation the great 
humiliations he is to undergo ; he is firmly resolved 
to drink even to the dregs the chalice presented to him ; 
the sight of torments and death seems not even to move 
him ; he walks with a firm step, awakes his apostles and 
says to them : " The hour is come : behold! the Son of 
Man shall be betrayed into the hands of sinners. . . . 
Rise up, let us go : he that will betray me, is at hand."* 

How well this language shows the state of his soul, 
strong now with all its divine strength ! His voice, 
a moment before subdued with fear, manifests now only 
a firmness, a courage, a resolution, which nothing can 
shake. 

" Kise up, let us go ;" behold the hour of combat, 
that hour for which I was sent, that hour which I 
have desired in order to show that I love my Father 
and do what he hath commanded. No, no ! I fear no 
longer torments or death : and not only do I resign my- 
self to them, but I desire them with a great desire ; I 
burn to have the baptism wherewith I am to be baptized 
accomplished in my person ; for I long to repair my 
Father's glory, I long to save men, I long to merit for 
them all the graces they require to fight with me and 
overcome the enemies of their salvation ! 

Ah ! it is at this moment, oh, my adorable Savior ! 
that thou settest forth as a giant to conquer sin and the 
devil ; it is at this moment that thou mayst say to thy divine 
* St. Mark, xiv. 41, 42. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 39 

Father those words foretold of thee ages before : — holo 
causts and other sacrifices did not suffice for the expiation 
of sin ; wherefore thou gavest me a body 5 and then I 
said, " behold I come, . . . that I should do thy will;"* 
behold I come ready to shed even the last drop of my 
blood to satisfy thy justice, to expiate sin and to save 
souls. 

But how has this change been wrought in thee, O 
divine Master ? Whence comes that courage, that 
strength of soul infinitely above all that earth and hell 
can undertake against thee t Ah ! I hear thee tell me 
that it is from thy humble and persevering prayer in the 
Garden of Olives, from the fervent and resigned prayer 
which penetrated the heavens and ascended to the very 
throne of thy Father. 

And this courage which thou hast derived from prayer, 
thou wouldst, O my divine Master ! communicate to thy 
disciples by addressing them in these words : " Arise, 
let us go, he is at hand who is to betray me : " arise, 
fear nothing : I am with you and I will sustain you in 
the fight. 

But it is not only to his disciples that the Savior says : 
" Arise," be no longer weighed down by your defects, 
drawn away by your evil inclinations ; arise and walk, 
advance towards good; " let us go," and fear not, for I 
am with you ; I am at your head, I ask of you only your 
co-operation ; do what you can, do not spare yourselves, 
and, on that condition, count on victory; for, with my 
grace and my assistance, you can do all, in the affair of 
salvation. 

* Ps. xxxix. 7-9. 



40 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

Jesus, O sweet Savior, how great is thy goodness 
towards us ! Thou say est not to us, " Arise, and go — " 
for whither should we go alone and separated from thee, 
if not to our eternal ruin ? But thou sayest to us, 
"Arise, let us go" — to teach us that thou art with 
us, that thou guidest us in the way we are to take, that 
thou sustain'est us in our conflicts. Ah ! what coidd we 
fear in thy company, O thou ! who art the source of all 
strength, the very Author of grace, by which we are 
made so powerful ! 

APPLICATION. 

It was not precisely for himself that Jesus Christ 
prayed in the garden of Olives ; but rather for us. It 
was in order to teach us how and in what circumstances 
we ought to pray, and also to merit for us the favor of 
being heard. 

But alas ! how little we imitate the sublime example 
he gives us ! Instead of praying, of having recourse to 
God in our trials, our troubles, our temptations, Ave seek 
support in creatures, we are discouraged, dejected ; and 
perhaps we are even foolish enough to think that Ave 
shall find some remedy for our trials and troubles, by 
allowing ourselves some infractions in our duties, by 
following our own ideas, our own inclinations. 

Ah ! let it not be so in future ; let us cast our eyes on 
Jesus, deriving from prayer the courage of his sacrifice ; 
in imitation of him, let us pray, and pray with fervor, 
especially at the approach of the trying moments, alas ! 
so frequent in the course of this life. 

Let us pray when aa-c feel our spiritual strength 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 41 

diminish, when work frightens us and the religious life 
seems to become too painful. 

Let us pray when the future presents itself to us under 
a sad or gloomy aspect, and we shall see the clouds that 
overshadowed us clear away. 

Let us pray when we are overtaken by adversity ; 
oh ! then let us prostrate ourselves before God, let us 
offer him our sighs and tears : we shall rise full of strength 
and courage, and, trusting in him, we shall embrace 
generously, and even lovingly, the . cross he wishes us 
to bear. 

Let us pray in union with Jesus Christ in the garden 
of Olives ; but let us see that our prayer has the quali- 
ties of his ; that is to say, that it be fervent, humble, and 
persevering. Let us pray, but with that ardor that will 
make our prayer pierce the heavens, and reach the feet 
of the Eternal. 

Let us watch and pray with Jesus ; let us beware of 
going alone to meet the enemy, let us never separate 
from our divine Master ; with him we can do all, with- 
out him nothing. Let us pray and watch ; let us never 
expose ourselves to danger, if we would not that our 
rashness should be our ruin. 

Happy is he who prays and watches ! he is calm and 
courageous when the moment of trial comes ; he desires 
only to immolate himself with Jesus Christ for the glory 
of Grod and the salvation of souls. 

PRAYER. 
I know that afflictions arc inevitable, and yet I 
shudder when they present themselves, and I am with- 



42 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

out resignation and without strength to accept them ; 
ah ! it is that I do not pray, or that I pray badly. 

Give me, then, O Jesus, my divine master ! give me, 
I entreat thee, this spirit of prayer which is likewise 
the spirit of strength ; grant that united to thee, I may 
prostrate myself before thy Father in my moments of 
anxiety or affliction, and expose to him the wants of my 
soul, beseeching him to have mercy on me. Perhaps I 
may not obtain that the bitter cup may be removed 
from me, but thy Father will grant me, what is infi- 
nitely preferable, resignation in trials, courage in adver- 
sity, and even the love of suffering ; that is to say, the 
virtues by which alone I can be like unto thee, and 
deserve to be one day a sharer in thy glory. 

(See Resumes, page 385.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 43 

EIGHTH MEDITATION. 
THE KISS OF JUDAS. 



Forthwith coming to Jesus, ... lie kissed him. 
St. Matt., xxvi. 49. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us go back to that moment when Jesus, celebrat- 
ing the last pasch with his apostles, addressed them in 
these words : " Amen I say to you, that one of you is 
about to betray me."* Let us consider the eleven 
apostles, full of candor and sincerity, asking him, 
" Is it I, Lord W 

Let us also consider Judas asking him the same 
question, when he had already sold him to the Jews for 
thirty pieces of silver. 

To perfidy he joins sacrilege, by receiving into his 
foul heart the body and blood of the adorable Savior ; 
and immediately after he goes out to find the Jews, and 
prepare all for giving up to them the victim whom they 
would sacrifice to their envy. He knows that his divine 
Master is to repair, after supper, to the Garden of Olives, 
and thither he is about to lead the band wherewith the 
chief priest has furnished him. 

The moment being come, he repairs thither accord- 
ingly, at the head of a band taken from amongst the 
very lowest of the people, with a certain number of the 
* St, Matt., xxvi. 21. 



44 MEDITATIONS OX THE PASSION 

soldiers and servants of the high priest. He directs 
them as to how they are to get hold of the Savior : 
" Whomsoever I shall kiss," said he " that is he, hold 
him fast.'' 

Meanwhile the traitor advances to the garden, and, 
leaving his people behind, he approaches Jesus whom 
he sees at a distance, and who, on his side, comes 
towards him, with a sweet and gentle aspect. 

Oh ! truly at the sight of his divine master advancing 
towards him, Judas must have felt horrified, and hesi- 
tated in the accomplishment of his crime 5 but alas ! he 
had so often stifled the remorse of his conscience, that 
it is not suprising if he rejects this new grace, which 
might still be the means of his salvation. 

The wretch dares to approach Jesus, and to say 
with affected kindness and with hypocritical calmness, 
" Hail Master." 

infamy ! he calls him his Master when he has 
sold him for some pieces of silver ! when he delivers 
him up as a vile slave ! when he has abandoned his 
school, base apostle that he is, to give himself up to the 
inspiration of Satan, and to accomplish the work of 
hell! 

He calls him his Master, and saluting him, advances 
to kiss him. "Stop, O Judas!" says St. Augustine, 
'' what a heinous sacrilege is thine ! Thoumakest use of 
a token of love to inflict a deep wound, and under the 
symbol of friendship thou givest death !" "0 perfidious 
man!" likewise says St. Ambrose, "how darest thou 
change into a treacherous sign the most expressive 
mark of union and of friendship ? " 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 45 

But the crime of Judas is consummated ; the signal 
given has been understood ; the innocent victim is 
pointed out to his enemies ! Jesus has shown no 
unwillingness to let the base apostate approach him : he 
has not rejected the touch of the traitor's impure lips, 
he has not turned away to avoid him : " He lovingly 
applied his divine mouth/ 7 says St. Bernard, " which 
knew not deceit, to that impious and sacrilegious mouth, 
which breathed forth only malice and treason." 

What a spectacle is presented to our contemplation ! 
Jesus intertwines his arms with those of the most infa- 
mous of men : he presses him to his bosom, he seems 
to make but one with him ! holiness is confounded with 
sin, goodness and love with wickedness and hatred ! 
Oh ! what charity, what generosity ! 

Jesus will look upon Peter to convert him, he will 
pray for his enemies, he will address to the good thief 
words of ineffable consolation : but he seems to do 
more for Judas — he offers him, he gives him the kiss of 
reconciliation ! 

prodigy of mercy ! who can henceforth despair of 
his pardon, if he really asks it and repents of his sins "I 

But let us hear the words of our divine Master, for, 
like his acts, they speak to us of his goodness : 
" Friend, whereto art thou come ? Judas, dost thou 
betray the Son of Man with a kiss ? " 

" Friend !" what a title for a traitor ! and yet Jesus 
calls him still by a name so sweet ! Ah ! who would 
have expected so much goodness on the part of the 
Sovereign of heaven and earth, from whom nothing is 
hidden, and who fathomed to its innermost depths the 



46 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

heart of the infamous disciple ! — He who has declared 
that he holds deceit in horror, calls " friend" the man 
who is to remain as the type of deceivers and hypocrites. 

Jesus ! how great and generous is thy tenderness ! 
Thou seest this unhappy man consummating his reproba- 
bation, and thou employest all the power of charity to 
soften his hardened heart, and to win it back again to 
grace, to salvation, to life ! 

After clasping him in thine arms, thou sayst to him, 
" Friend, whereto art thou come ?" It was the exhor- 
tation to re-enter into himself; it was saying: "Thou 
art come to betray thy Master, to deliver him to his 
enemies; ah! acknowledge thy crime, I am ready to 
forgive thee ; thou seest that, far from rejecting thee, 
I press thee lovingly to my heart." 

But no ! Judas will not repent, he will not ask pardon 
of his divine Master ; his pervesse will resists all the 
graces offered to him ; the sacrilege whereof he is 
guilty, drags him down to the depth of the abyss of evil, 
and closes against him every way of returning. 

APPLICATION. 

We shudder at the thought of the crime and the mis- 
fortune of Judas ; but do we consider that that crime 
and that misfortune may be ours, if we do not try 
to take another way than that which he followed ? 

Like him, we are companions of the Savior, ad- 
mitted to secret and most intimate communion with 
him, nourished with the Eucharistic Bread, called by 
the name of friends ; but do we not abuse, as he did, 
the graces bestowed upon us ? Do we never allow 



OF OUR LORD JESUS* CHRIST. 47 

ourselves to be governed by our evil inclinations ? Let 
us examine ourselves on this point, and distrust our- 
selves because of our passions, and combat them, for 
there is none of these that may not lead us to the most 
deplorable excesses and the greatest misfortunes. 

Let us be warned by the example of Judas. It is 
not at one stroke that he becomes a deicide ; if he had 
been told some months before — " Thou shalt sell thy 
Savior, thou shalt deliver him to his enemies " — he 
would have spurned with indignation that fatal pre- 
diction ; and yet he fell to that degree of wicked- 
ness ! 

Ah ! we, too reject now as an injury even the least 
suspicion of our fidelity ; we should be indignant if we 
were believed capable of betraying our God ; and yet 
if we are not faithful to the divine inspirations, if we 
do not profit by the graces offered us, if we neglect 
our duties, our fate shall be that of Judas 5 for walking 
in the same way that he followed, we should assuredly 
fall down the precipice in which it ends, and we 
should, perchance, come to say to the devil and our 
passions : " What will you give me, and I will deliver 
to you the divine Master ? Grant me this satisfaction, 
this honor, this pleasure, and I will drive Jesus from 
my heart, and give up my soul to you." 

Oh ! may that misfortune never befall us ! may we, 
on the contrary, always say : u Divine Savior, rather a 
thousand times over let me lose all, sacrifice all, than 
separate mysef from thee, even for a single moment !" 



CI 



48 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

PRAYER. 

O Jesus, from whom nothing is hidden, cast on me 
a look of mercy, and if thou dost discover in my heart 
any disorderly affection, any tie which binds it to the 
feature, separate, cut, break : what matters the suffering 
the trial will cause, provided I am faithful to thee f Let 
me not be so unfortunate as to abandon thee, to betray 
thee, O thou who art the tenderest of friends and the 
best of masters ! 

The crime of Judas has struck me with horror. 
Oil! grant that there may be no more Judases 
amongst Christians, and especially amongst religious. 
Stop us at the first step we might take in the way of 
evil ; help us to walk faithfully in thy footsteps, to the 
end that at our last day we may go with confidence to 
thee, O sweet Savior ! and that we may receive from 
thine adorable mouth the kiss of peace which makes 
supreme felicity. 

(See Resumes, page 385.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 49 

NINTH MEDITATION. 
JESUS TAKEN BY THE JEWS. 



Then the band, and the tribune, and the servants of the Jews, 
took Jesus and bound him." — St. John, xviii. 12. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us contemplate our adorable Savior advancing 
towards his enemies, after receiving the kiss of Judas. 
It is a victim devoting himself voluntarily to death ; it 
is a tender lamb which, far from complaining at the 
moment when he is about to be led to the altar of his 
sacrifice, presents himself to those who are sent to take 
him ; it is the Son of God offering himself to his Father 
for the redemption of mankind. 

Behold him then, face to face with his enemies, who 
seem confounded in his divine presence ; no one dares 
to speak to him and still less to seize his person. He 
must speak first, as though to bring them to show their 
intentions concerning him : " Whom seek ye '? " ho 
asks them. Doubtless their embarrassment must have 
been great, and they would not have dared to say any- 
thing, had they not read in the features of that adorable 
Savior a sort of invitation to express their thought, 
and to declare the motive of their coming to that place, 
at that hour. They tell him, therefore, with a certain 
reserve, that they seek Jesus of Nazareth. 



50 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

Wishing to give them a new proof of his divinity, 
and to offer them a new means of salvation, Jesus 
Christ answers, "I am he," and immediately all drew 
back, and fell to the ground. 

"How admirable it is," says St. Cyril, "to see these 
barbarous men, come to take our adorable Savior, 
thrown to the ground by a single word of his ! How 
beautiful it is to recognize in this incident the Almighty 
power of God, manifesting itself in Jesus Christ at the 



"Cease," says St. Ambrose, " to speak to me of tin' 
legions of angels that Jesus might order down from 
heaven ; for in throwing down his enemies with a 
single word, he manifests his power in a far different 
manner, and proves more effectually that he is the 
Messiah foretold by the prophets." 

Nevertheless, it is not to prevent his enemies from 
taking him that Jesus Christ works this prodigy, but 
rather to make them enter into themselves : that word 
which casts them to the ground is a shaft of his mercy, 
it is an effect of the grace which ealls them to repent- 
ance. 

But, alas ! the voice of the Lord, which, according to 
Scripture, " breaketh the cedars,"* has no influence on 
Judas, nor on the people who accompany him ; their 
hearts are too hardened, they had abused grace too 
much not to abuse it still. 

Yet, willing to give them still another proof of his 
power and to manifest his affection for his disciples, 
* Ps. xxviii. 5. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 51 

Jesus again speaks to the band of wretches who have 
come to take him, and tells them with as much calmness 
as majesty : "If, therefore, you seek me, let these go their 
way."* At this command, the soldiers opened their 
ranks and allowed the apostles to escape, although it 
would have been their interest to detain them with their 
master. 

How touching is this trait of the Redeemer's love, by 
which he fulfilled the words he had addressed to his 
Father : "Of those whom thou gavest me, I have lost 
not one ! " Forgetful of himself, he thinks only of 
placing his disciples in safety ; ready to accept cap- 
tivity and death for himself, he secures to them life and 
liberty. 

Jesus does not content himself with giving these two 
tokens of his power, he compels his enemies to hear his 
reproaches ; he once more addresses them and says : 
" Are you come out, as it were against a thief, with 
swords and clubs 1 when I was daily with you in the 
temple, you did not stretch forth your hands against 
me." f 

What majestic language ! How well it proves, together 
with the accompanying facts, that this divine Savior is 
truly God, the master of his freedom, the willing victim 
of his saci'ifice ! 

But the moment is at last come — Jesus is going to let 
his enemies act, " That the scriptures may be ful- 
filled. .... This is your hour and the power of dark- 
ness." 

He then gives himself up to their power. 

* St. John, xviii. 8. t St. Luke, xxii. 52, 53. 



52 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

Thereupon these wretches lay hold of him, load him 
with chains, and drag him away with them. 

Behold, then, Christian souls, behold your Savior 
bound as a malefactor ; behold the true Samson taken by 
the cruel Philistines ; behold that innocent lamb led to 
the slaughter, or rather, behold your God who has 
delivered himself for you to your enemies ! 

" O perfidious and cruel soldiers ! " exclaims St. 
Ambrose, " do you, then, load with chains the author of 
life and of liberty, even him at whose feet you ought to 
cast yourselves, praying him to free you from the bonds 
of your iniquities ? " 

But no ! devoured by hatred and envy, those wicked 
men hesitate not in the accomplishment of their crime ; 
they rejoice to have in their power him whose destruc- 
tion they have sworn ; and he, full of love for us, allows 
himself to be grasped by the throat without resistance ; 
holds out his hands for the chains of his enemies, in order 
to merit for us deliverance from the chains of sin, 
whereby the devil holds us captive. 

APPLICATION. 

Let us adore the power of our Divine Redeemer who 
casts his enemies to the ground by the speaking of a 
single word: " I am he." Let us think that he often 
addresses it to us, and examine whether it has its full 
effect on our souls. 

Doth he not say to us : " I am he " whom you offend ; 
"I am he" whom you serve so badly; "I am he" 
who ought to be the continual object of your thoughts, 
and who yet is seldom present to your mind, even on 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 53 

the days when I have given myself to you in my sacra- 
ment. Oh ! let us, then, understand what our adorable 
Master would have us do, and practise it generously. 

Let the power which he manifests to his enemies by 
the words, "I am he," make us think of that which he 
will manifest before the whole world when he shall 
come, at the last day, to judge all men. Let us impress 
our minds with sentiments of salutary fear, and say 
with St. Augustine : " How terrible will this Jesus be 
when he shall come to reign, who is so terrible now 
when about to die ! " 

Let us ask ourselves why our adorable Savior has 
permitted himself to be taken and bound by his enemies, 
and let us understand that it is to merit for us the grace 
of breaking the ties that keep us in sin ; to obtain for 
us strength and courage to break off every attachment 
of our heart to creatures, every fatal habit that would 
retain us in evil, every dangerous connection that might 
become, in our regard, a chain placed in the hands of 
Satan to drag us into the abyss. Let us understand, 
also, that it is to obtain for us the peace to attach our- 
selves only to Grod, to his service, to our holy vocation, 
and to be indissolubly united to our divine Redeemer 
by the sweet ties of piety and charity. 

Oh ! how he has loved us ! He is truly the slave of 
his love for us. Yes, it is his love that delivers him to 
his enemies, that binds his hands, that is going to drag 
him to the altar of his immolation. How can we 
recall this without blessing him for it, without exalting 
his goodness, without resolving to love him as long as 
we are able to love ! 



54 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

•PRAYER. 

O Jesus ! who, to break our chains, consented to be 
bound like a malefactor by an insolent and ferocious 
band, we give thee thanks for having freed us from the 
shameful bondage of our passions, and made us par- 
takers of the liberty of the children of God. Oh ! how 
precious is that liberty which thou hast procured for 
us ! but alas! it often happens that I cease to value it, 
and willingly deprive myself of so great a good. 

Unhappy that I am, thou hast delivered me from my 
bonds by the grace of baptism, and afterwards by that 
of the sacrament of penance, and I, by my negligence, 
forge for myself new chains ! Have mercy on me, Lord ! 
and help me ; grant that I may persevere in my 
present resolution of being all thine, to the end that my 
soul may have no other tics than the sweet and pleasant 
ones of thy most pure love. 

(See Resumes, page 386.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 

TENTH MEDITATION. 
JESUS IS BROUGHT TO JERUSALEM. 



Then, apprehending him, they led him to the high priest': 
house." — St. Luke, xxii. 54. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Jesus is in the power of his enemies. He had said : 
u The Son of man shall be betrayed into the hands of 
sinners,"* and that word is accomplished. Hours 
before, the Passion of his soul began, and now begins 
that of his body. 

What sorrows, what opprobrium does he not endure ? 

Weakened by his agony and bloody sweat, his heart 
broken by the treason of Judas and the flight of the 
other apostles, he sees himself in the power of the 
inhuman soldiers who mock and insult him without 
pity. 

The prophets had seen him in that state ; hence they 
represent him as a lamb surrounded by a multitude of 
ravenous dogs, of ferocious wolves, of roaring lions ready 
to devour him. 

" Hold him fast," Judas had told them; see that he 
does not escape : and in pursuance of this advice, the 
soldiers bind him tightly with many cords ; they crowd 
around him and enclose him as in a circle. 
* St. Mark, xiv. 41. 



56 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

Let us contemplate the true Samson in the hands of 
the new Philistines. They exult in having him at last 
in their power, and their triumph is most insolent and 
tyrannical. Let us hear them as they shout in mockery 
and derision, call their divine captive every odious name, 
and insulting in every possible way him who bears 
their outrages without resistance, without anger, with- 
out complaint, without emotion. 

It depends on himself to renew the prodigy of Samson 
breaking his bonds, and striking dead those who had 
bound him. He has but to will it, and immediately his 
chains shall be broken, and all his enemies cast down 
dead ! . . . But such is not his purpose : he wants to 
expiate our sins in as much as they are the abuse of 
our liberty ; he wants to merit for us the grace of 
breaking the bonds of our iniquities, the chains of our 
evil habits ; he wants to free us from the slavery of the 
devil to establish us in the liberty of the children of 
God ; he wants to merit for the martyrs and confessors 
of the Faith all the graves of which they shall have 
need, when the enemies of religion shall seize and drag 
them to prison, and thence before the judgment seat : — 
for this it is that he holds out his hands to the chains 
which are to bind them. What charity to us ! What 
devotion to the glory of his Church ! 

"If he represses his power," says St. Leo, "if he 
permits all the hatred of his enemies to vent itself on 
his adorable person, it is an effect of that same will 
whereby he has always loved us." Yes, if Jesus is in 
the power of his enemies, it is his love for us that has 
given him up to them. love, how strong art thou » 
thou bindest God himself. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. o7 

Meanwhile, the sad procession sets forward on its 
march. What a humiliation for Jesus to be led away 
thus like a malefactor ! He makes no resistance 5 he 
alleges neither his weakness nor his fatigue ; he offers 
no remark on the way in which he is treated : he is a 
lamb, mute in the hands of those who lead him to the 
slaughter, or rather to the altar on which he is going to 
be immolated. 

Without allowing even one complaint to escape him, 
he does all he is ordered ; he takes the way pointed 
out to him ; he walks through mud, through water, and 
over stones, wherever his conductors please. 

Forgetting himself to think only of the work of our 
reconciliation with heaven, he regards all the contempt, 
all the indignity wherewith he is loaded, as the strokes 
of divine justice, avenging on his sacred humanity the 
sins of men ; he offers up these sufferings, these 
indignities, to the Eternal Father, to obtain from his 
infinite mercy the pardon of all our iniquities. He 
makes no movement, breathes no sigh, suffers no single 
pain that he does not apply to our salvation, our 
deliverance ; he thinks only of drawing us from the way 
of vice and perdition, to make us walk in that of virtue 
and happiness. 

The soldiers continue to treat him with the greatest 
inhumanity ; fearing that he may escape them, or that 
some of his friends may come to deliver him, they urge 
him to hasten his steps, and with that intention, some 
pull him by the cords wherewith he is bound, others 
brutally push him on, some strike him with a stick, 
others belch forth the most revolting blasphemy, the 
vilest epithets. 



58 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

The cortege at last reaches Jerusalem. Oh ! how- 
different is the entry of Jesus into Jerusalem from that 
which he had made five days before ! Then a great 
multitude came forth to meet him, with acclamation, 
saying, " Hosanna to the Son of David ! "* and now he 
is in the hands of cruel enemies shouting their death 
cries, insulting him in the most odious manner, and 
seeming, under cover of the darkness, to be emboldened 
to lav their sacrilegious hands upon him. Then they 
went to meet him as a conqueror with palms in their 
hands, and now they treat him as a criminal with the 
grossest indignity. 

O strange instability of the world ! ingratitude 
of men who ignore the benefits they have received 
from Jesus, who repay only with outrage the miracles 
he has wrought in their behalf! O inconceivable 
patience, generosity of our divine Redeemer, who 
resigns himself to every humiliation to restore us to the 
state of glory from which we had fallen, and who accepts 
all manner of suffering and opprobrium as so many 
penalties for our sins, the responsibility of which- he 
has taken upon himself before his Father ! 

APPLICATION. 

Let us admire the patience, the meekness, the infinite 
charity of Jesus, the august Victim of our Redemption, 
allowing himself to be dragged, without complaining, 
to the altar of sacrifice, or rather going thither of him- 
self, through the great desire he has to work out our 
salvation. 

* St. Matt., xxi. 9. 



- OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 59 

Let us compassionate what lie suffers on this occasion 
when he is surrounded by a crowd of wicked men, dis- 
honored, buffeted, treated worse than the greatest of 
villains. 

Let us magnify his generosity : let us never forget 
that he became a captive to deliver us from the slavery 
of sin, that he allowed himself to be loaded with chains 
to break ours ; that he was dragged to death to put us 
again in the way of life. 

Oh ! how astonishing is his love for us ! Who can ever 
celebrate worthily the divine Heart which is its focus ! 

In order to form an idea of what we owe to him, it is 
necessary to understand the misfortune of a soul which 
the devils hold captive, — which they lead at will, — which 
they degrade more and more, — on which they exercise 
their cruel sway, — which they are dragging down to the 
fiery abyss wherein are everlasting tears and despair. 
What a fate ! And it is from this fate that Jesus 
delivers us by his sufferings ! 

Let us bless the divine Liberator, and profit by his 
merits. Perhaps our soul is now the slave of Satan. 
Ah ! if so, let us have recourse to Jesus, reminding him 
of what he has done for our deliverance ; let us beseech 
liim to assist us by his grace to break the shameful 
bonds wherewith the devils bind us, and to make us 
walk in his train in the narrow way which alone leads 
to life. 

Let us follow in the footsteps of our adorable Master. 
With him, Jet us take the way of pain and humiliation, 
and we shall one day arrive with him, at the abode of 
glory and bliss to which it leads. 



60 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

PRAYER, 

O Jesus ! who, in order to merit for us the privilege 
of being freed from the devils, suffered thyself to be 
dragged ignominiously from Gethsemane to Jerusalem, 
and through the streets of that eity along which thou 
hast so often passed, multiplying thy benefits, have mercy 
on sinners ! How pitiable is their lot ! Thy enemies 
and ours hold them in their power; they are leading 
them wheresoever they will; they are dragging them 
to hell. Ah ! come to their assistance, and save them ' 

O Jesus, have mercy on my poor soul. Alas ! am I 
not myself the slave of demons ? Do they not keep me 
bound by my self-love, by my pride, by my sloth ? 
are they not taking me whither they will? are they not 
leading me on to tepidity, to drag me afterwards to sin 
and death ? Grant, by thy grace, that I may break 
asunder these odious chains, so that I may be, till my 
life's end, only the slave of thy love. 

(See Resumes, page 886.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 61 

ELEVENTH MEDITATION. 
JESUS BEFORE ANNAS. 



They led hirn away to Annas first, for he was father-in-law to 
Caiaphas." — St. John, xviii. 13. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us consider our Divine Savior in the power of 
his enemies who have resolved on his ruin. 

They would have him declared worthy of death, and 
have their judgment confirmed by the governor. But 
what cause can they assign for the condemnation of a 
man who had defied them to convict him of a single sin? 
Above all, how is Pilate to be brought to sanction that 
sentence, if it have not sufficient grounds, and be but 
evident injustice % Their hatred, their envy might well 
lead them to sacrifice an innocent man, but they had no 
reason to think that the governor shared the same senti- 
ments. And yet his concurrence was indispensable to 
them. 

It was expedient, then, that in order to gain their 
end, they should put forward some pretext that would 
have a reasonable appearance, and on which they might 
found their accusations against Jesus ; hence they adopted 
the plan of indicting him before their own tribunals, 
and, according to his answers, to concert afterwards 
amongst themselves what charges they should bring 
against him at Pilate's tribunal. 



62 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

They commence with taking him before Annas, the 
former high-priest ; he was a man avaricious, proud, 
voluptuous, cruel, the inveterate enemy of the life and 
person of Jesus. Having grown old in malice, he was 
the fittest person to correspond with the views of the 
other enemies of that Divine Savior, and to suggest to 
them the means to be taken in order to make the just 
man, whose ruin they were compassing, worthy of death. 
They also wished to give that base pontiff the barbarous 
satisfaction of seeing at his feet him whose virtue and 
reputation so strongly excited his hatred and envy. 

In the hope that, this time, the enterprise against the 
Savior would succeed, and that he would soon be 
brought before him, Annas had all things prepared ; 
the tribunal was erected, the judges were assembled, and 
the people who were devoted to that wicked pontiff, 
were warned to be ready t<> applaud the iniquitous 
sentence which he thought he would be enabled to 
pronounce. 

Meanwhile Jesus arrives ; the soldiers bring him in, 
and place him in the midst of that impious assembly ; 
all eyes are turned towards him, ami each one seems 
to have no other thought, no other wish, no other 
ambition, than to see him confounded, humbled, con- 
demned to death. 

Ah ! let us contemplate him with the liveliest com- 
passion, in the state to which he is reduced ! There he 
stands, in the midst of his enemies, and in the posture of a 
criminal ; his garments torn and tossed bear witness to 
the ill treatment he has already undergone ; his face is 
pale and haggard; his head is bent forward, his eyes 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 63 

cast to the ground ; his hair, moist with the sweat of 
his agony, falls dishevelled on his shoulders ; his knees 
are bending with fatigue ; his hands are bound, manacled 
like those of a common malefactor ; his ears hear only 
insulting words, blasphemies against his adorable person 
and his divine doctrine ; his heart is sunk in most bitter 
sorrow. 

Ah ! this is, indeed, the victim of the great sacrifice, 
the Lamb who is about to be immolated, by the fury of 
men, to the divine justice, which he has charged him- 
self to satisfy for our crimes. 

Annas interrogates Jesus ; but the Divine Master 
refuses to answer him : his silence, which ought to have 
made his enemies re-enter into themselves, did but 
increase their fury, and because it defeats their projects, 
they see in it only a motive for renewing their cruel 
outrages against him. 

Oh ! what astonishment for the celestial spirits to 
consider the Most High, the God thrice holy, appearing 
before a miserable man, and in the attitude of a criminal 
before his judge ! What is their surprise, their indigna- 
tion, to hear an infamous sinner address reproaches to him 
who alone is true virtue — to see a vile creature authori- 
tatively question the Creator — an ignorant man seeking 
to surprise the very wisdom of God in his words — a 
sacrilegious priest arrogating to himself the right of judg- 
ing the eternal Pontiff! 

Ah ! like them, let us be amazed — or rather, let us 
not be surprised, for we know, alas ! by a too sad 
experience that man is capable of all evil ; and we know 
well enough the heart of our "-onerous Savior, not to 



64 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

wonder if he drains, alone through love for us, the 
chalice of all sorrows and of all humiliations. 

He drinks it with long draughts, at this moment when 
he leaves all the powers of darkness free to act ; he 
suffers cruel pains in that inclosure where, amongst the 
multitude present, there is not a single man but insults 
and abuses him. 

And yet he remains calm and resigned : he says not 
a word, he lets no complaint escape him ; his heart, 
incapable of hatred or resentment, feels only love and 
pity for his enemies ; he offers to his divine Father the 
bad treatment with which he his overwhelmed, and 
prays for the salvation even of those who abuse him. 

APPLICATION. 

Let us learn from the example of our divine Redeemer 
to suffer like him, without complaining, the injustice of 
men, and to be full of charity even to our enemies. 
Disciples of a God despised, hated, calumniated, need we 
be surprised, and can we dare to complain, at being 
treated as our Master was 1 

If we are accused, despised, rejected, let us think of 
Jesus before Annas. Let us hear the accusations 
brought against him, the insulting words addressed to 
him ; and then ask ourselves whether we have a right to 
plume ourselves on a reputation ill-understood, whilst our 
Lord and our God was buffeted and degraded to the 
very lowest. 

Patience, therefore, and resignation, if we are humbled, 
outraged, if all manner of evil is falsely said of us ! Was 
not infinitely more done to Jesus ? and are we not, 



OP OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. . 65 

like him, free from all blame, and in a position to defy 
our enemies to convict us of sin ? 

Ah ! we deceive ourselves if we hope to sanctify our- 
selves by any other way than that of humility and 
abnegation : it is the only one that Christ followed ; no 
other can lead us to salvation. 

Let us take care that some disorderly passion is not 
the principle of our words, of our actions, of our conduct ; 
let us often examine by what motive we act ; if we truly 
seek God and not the gratification of self-love. 

Let us watch carefully over the affections of our heart 
and the thoughts of our mind, so that envy and jealousy 
may never enter in ; let us see whither those passions 
led the Jews in regard to our Lord. Let us love our 
brothers, and let charity be the only sentiment that 
reigns in our souls ; let our line of conduct be the very 
opposite to that of the Pharisees ; let us be severe 
towards ourselves and indulgent to others. 

Let us always act with uprightness and simplicity, 
avoiding all cunning, all deceit, because sooner or later 
the double mind finds itself confounded. 

Let us faithfully observe this conduct ; and by that 
means we shall please Jesus Christ, we shall gladden his 
divine heart, we shall offer him a compensation for the 
outrages he endured on the part of the Jews, and we 
shall apply to ourselves the merits of his sacrifice. 

PRAYER. 

O Jesus, Eternal Wisdom ! what can they be but 
fools who oppose thee ! Thy very silence suffices to 
defeat their schemes, and turn them to their own con- 



GG MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

fusion! Give, me, I beseech thee, simplicity and 
uprightness of heart, to the end that I may never inspire 
myself with that carnal prudence which is but folly 
before thee, and which ends only in confusion. Free 
me, O my God ! from all prejudice, from all envy, and 
grant that charity only may reign in my soul ! 

Grant me also the grace of sincere humility : ah ! 
how shameful it is for me to resemble thee so little ! I 
have contemplated thee become an object of contempt 
for men : would I, then, still desire their esteem ? Oh ! 
no ! let it be so no more, O my divine Master ! grant 
that I may walk faithfully in thy footsteps, and that I 
may appreciate only what can give me some conformity 
with thee. 

(See Resumes, page 387.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 

TWELFTH MEDITATION. 
JESUS IS BROUGHT TO CAIAPHAS, 



" Annas sent him bound to Caiaphas, the • high priest. 
St. John, xviii. 24. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us contemplate our divine Savior still before the 
pontiff Annas, who continues to humble him and to put 
insidious questions to him ; he replies to none, and by 
that silence disconcerts his enemies. Hence this first 
examination will be of no avail : the eternal wisdom 
therein defeats the malice of hell, and it results in 
proving that there was nothing in Jesus to blame, and 
that, consequently, those who sought to have him con- 
demned were themselves worthy of condemnation. 

But those wretches, blinded by envy, reflect not on 
the injustice of their conduct, and will carry out to the 
end their iniquitous design. Annas can find nothing 
reprehensible in Jesus ; nevertheless, he orders him to 
be still more tightly bound than when he was brought 
before him, and he commands him to be brought before 
the tribunal of Caiaphas, his son-in-law, the high priest 
of that year. 

Let us behold, then, the divine Redeemer dragged 
anew by those who had so inhumanly brought him from 
the garden of Olives to Jerusalem; let us accompany 
him going from that tribunal to a second, where he is to 



68 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

undergo insults still greater than those he had already 
experienced, and suffering by the way all sorts of 
indignity and outrage. 

Let us contemplate him traversing the streets of 
Jerusalem that night of gloom and guilt ; he is bound 
with cords as the holy Gospel indicates ; his steps are 
tottering, his whole appearance denotes excessive fatigue, 
.utter prostration ; and yet the soldiers and servants 
muck his pains and insult him without pity ; they pull 
roughly the cords that bind him; they push him 
rudely from side to side, they seem to profit by the 
darkness of night to exercise their cruelty more freely ; 
several Pharisees are amongst these wretches, scoffing 
and mocking him ; and thus commences that horrible 
concert of sacrilegious mockery which shall continue 
till the moment when the divine Savior expires on 
( lalvary. 

Ah ! who shall tell us what he suffers at this moment! 
who shall sound the abyss of grief in which his heart 
is plunged '. 

He is the king of Sinn, and he receives in Sion, and 
from his subjects, only outrage and ignominy ; a crowd, 
already considerable, goes before and after him, but it is 
to cry out for his death; the noise of the hideous mob 
to which he is given over, awakes by the way the 
inhabitants of Jerusalem, who inquire what is going on, 
and who soon will come forth to increase the number, 
already so great, of those who are clamoring for the 
death of the adorable victim. 

If. from time to time, Jesus raises his eyes, he sees 
not even one of his own followers who might console 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 69 

him, at least by his presence ; he meets no pitying face. 
In those streets of Jerusalem where he had performed 
so many cures, he beholds only his enemies eager for 
his ruin. 

Oh ! with what a sword of grief his divine soul is 
transpierced ! for in fine, those who abuse him and 
compass his death, are his people, his children ; and he 
has for them infinitely more affection than the tenderest 
of mothers could have for an only- son. He loves them 
with a boundless love, and he sees himself despised, 
hated, rejected ; all are animated with the same fury, 
all load him with curses as they drag him before a 
bloody tribunal ! 

Oh ! how eloquently does the state to which he is 
reduced speak to our hearts, in these first circumstances 
of his grievous passion ! 

Come, my children ! — that adorable Master seems to 
say to us, — behold to what a degree I love you, since it 
is for you I submit to so much humiliation. 

Behold me in the power of furious enemies; no one 
takes up my defence ; my friends and my kindred have 
abandoned me, my apostles have forsaken me, I bear 
alone the weight of my sorrow, because I must bear 
alone your iniquities. The pain I feel is that which 
your crimes have deserved; these chains wherewith 
T am loaded, are the bonds whereby the devil held you 
captive and was dragging you into the eternal abyss ; 1 
patiently suffer my enemies to make the most horrible 
imprecations against me, in order to preserve you from 
the divine malediction which you have deserved ; J 
resign myself to all the ill-treatment they give me, in 



70 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASMOX 

order to save you from the punishment reserved for 
sinners ; I will not prevent the tribunal before which 
they take me from pronouncing an iniquitous sentence, 
and that in order to preserve you from the sentence of 
damnation which was so justly your due. 

Oh ! what sentiments of gratitude ought to be excited 
within us at sight of our Lord's devotedness in sacrific- 
ing himself to save us, resigning himself for our sake to 
be dragged ignominiously through the streets of 
Jerusalem, to be brought before the supreme tribunal 
of the nation, there to be interrogated and judged as a 
criminal ! 

He is the thrice holy God, and he consents to be a 
prisoner, and afterwards a condemned malefactor — 
and he is even already condemned by the members of 
the grand Council, before whom he has not yet 
appeared, but who have long decided to pass sentence 
of death upon him. 

He is a victim fore-doomed to a cruel immolation, 
but resigning himself to every pain in order to expiate 
our sins. 

APPLICATION. 

We have contemplated our adorable Savior, the 
anointed King of Sion, given up to the power of the 
wicked, ignominiously dragged through the streets of 
Jerusalem, receiving nought but outrage in the very 
capital, — hearing, instead of acclamations and shouts of 
joy, only insults, curses, and blasphemies. 

Oh! let us not forget this circumstance of the 
passion of Jesus, when, in the discharge of our duties, 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. V i 

we pass along the streets of the cities in which we are 
employed. Let us be recollected, modest, united with 
Grod ; let us pray, meditate, watch over our senses, and 
in case we should become the object of derision, let us 
esteem ourselves happy in being treated as was our 
divine Master ; like him, let us bear it with patience 
and resignation, and pray for the conversion of those 
who insult us. 

Let us try, by our fervor and our fidelity in the service 
of Jesus, to make his divine heart forget the sorrows 
wherewith it was overwhelmed during his passion. 

Let us revive within us the most lively sentiments of 
love and gratitude toward him, remembering that he 
endured curses and blasphemies to merit for us that we 
might not be accursed of God his Father ; and that he 
endured all manner of abuse in order to free us from the 
everlasting pain and contempt we ought to suffer on 
account of our sins. 

Ah ! with thoughts like these, how could we but 
love him with the greatest love? How could we but 
bless and thank him unceasingly ? How could we but 
devote ourselves unreservedly to him, and only regret 
being unable to do more for his glory ? 

Let us prostrate ourselves in his presence, offer him 
our homage, and form the sincere resolution, not only 
to do nothing that may displease him, but to act in all 
things, only by the movement of his love and in perfect 
conformity to his divine will. 



72 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

PRAYER, 

I adore thee, O my divine Redeemer ! whom I eon- 
template led from the house of Annas to that of Caiaphas, 
and left at the mercy of a band of wretches who unceas- 
ingly insult and illtreat thee in every possible way : 
these unhappy men know that the people are still 
favorable to thee, wherefore they profit by the darkness 
of night to torture thee and glut their rage upon thee. 
Soon alas ! they will have gained over the populace, 
and then shall no longer fear to abuse and maltreat 
thee in open day and before the multitude : hence, the 
very darkness of night is for thee, at this moment, an 
occasion of suffering, to which thou resignest thyself 
without uttering so much as one complaint. 

But why, O my adorable Savior, wouldst thou suffer 
by night and by day \ Ah ! I understand ; it is because 
thou art the victim of expiation, and the night and the 
day have been equally profaned by our sins. 

Oh ! grant that I may weep both day and night for 
those sins which are the true cause of our suffering, and 
may never more commit them. 

(See Resumes, page 387.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 73 

THIRTEENTH MEDITATION. 
JESUS BEFORE CAIAPHAS. 



"They led him to Caiaphas, the high priest." — St. Matt., xxvi. 57. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us consider before what persons Jesus is going 
to appear. Annas sends him bound to Caiaphas, his son- 
in-law, and' the council of the ancients and doctors of 
the law assembled at the house of that pontiff. 

Caiaphas was an artful man who, as St. Jerome 
asserts, had sold for gold the pontifical dignity. He 
had been long seeking the death of Jesus, as he pub- 
licly showed in an assembly caUed together on the 
occasion of the resurrection of Lazarus, when — 
addressing the Pharisees who composed it — he spoke 
these words the fuU meaning of which he did not 
understand : " You know nothing at all ; neither do you 
consider that it is expedient for you that one man 
should die for the people, and that the whole nation 
perish not." * 

Caiaphas is the author of the base plot formed against 
Jesus, whose most cruel and hypocritical enemy he is. 
It was he that sent his people to Gethsemane to seize 
that divine Master, and bring him into his presence. 

He assembles at his house, at that late hour of the 
* St. John, xi. 49, 50. 



74 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

night, the council of the nation, of which he is the 
president by virtue of his office, and which is composed 
of the enemies of Jesus. 

Let us transport ourselves in spirit to the hall where 
the priests, the ancients of the people, and the doctors 
of the law, are seated, waiting till the august captive is 
brought before them. 

They form that iniquitous assembly concerning which 
the Holy Ghost had. said by David : " From the face 
of the wicked who have afflicted me. My enemies 
have surrounded my soul."* They likewise fulfil that 
which was revealed in the book of Wisdom, where it is 
written that the wicked form plots against the just, 
saying : " Let us condemn him to a most shameful 
death."t 

Oh ! how clearly these words reveal to us the per- 
versity of the chiefs of the Jewish nation at that 
moment which Jesus called the " hour of the powers of 
darkness ! " Yes ! it is indeed they who, having decided 
beforehand to put to death him whose holiness and 
justice excited their envy, say amongst themselves, 
" Let us condemn him," and not, " Let us examine 
whether he deserves to be condemned." 

Ah ! they well know that there is nothing in him 
that can be even censured, for he has publicly said to 
them, u Which of you shall convince me of sin ''."% 
They well know that his whole life has been one unbroken 
series of benefits ; that he has healed the sick, driven 
out devils, raised many dead to life. " But," says St. 
Augustine, " these wretches appear to have forgotten 
7 Ps., xvi. 9. t Wisdom, ii. 20. \ St. John, viii. 46. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 75 

this, and like persons in the delirium of fever, they are 
angry with the physician who came to cure them, and 
they have combined to destroy him."* 

The chief priests and the doctors of the law are those 
husbandmen mentioned in the Gospel, to whom the 
father of the family sent his own son, and who, plotting, 
say amongst themselves : u This is the heir, come, let 
us kill him, and cast him out of the vineyard." t 

This tribunal, before which Jesus is about to appear, 
is not composed of upright men, assembled to examine 
his cause and administer justice to him ; but rather of 
murderers turned into judges, and having but one end 
in view — the immolation of him whom they make show 
of trying. Oh ! what injustice ! what a subversion of 
all order ! what hypocrisy ! 

They are criminals, the miserable slaves of their 
passions, who arrogate to themselves the right of sum- 
moning before them to be judged him who is justice itself 
— him who is the supreme judge of the living and the 
dead : it is under the false pretence of defending law 
and religion that they plot the death of the supreme Law- 
giver, of the very Author of religion ! Apparently, it 
is zo;il for sacred worship that animates them; whilst, in 
reality, it is a base and cruel envy of him whose glory 
and sanctity they cannot endure. 

Such are the men before whom Jesus is about to be 
arraigned. He arrives, in fact, in the hall where they 
are assembled. He appears before them ignominiously 
bound, and surrounded by soldiers and the servants of 
the high priest ; all eyes are turned upon him, and 
* Treatise on the Psalms, Ps. lxiii. 2. t St. Matt., xxi. 38. 



76 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

every member of the council manifests a barbarous 
pleasure in seeing him at his feet, and in the attitude of 
a criminal awaiting his sentence. 

Oh ! who shall tell us what our adorable Master feels 
in his heart ? He sees only enemies without fear of 
God, and resolved to violate all the laws of justice. 
Standing before that assembly of the wicked, he appears 
crushed beneath the weight of humiliations, and per- 
ceives only subjects of pain and sorrow ; words of insult 
and of blasphemy alone strike his ear ; no friendly look 
meets his eye ; no one takes up his defence, no one 
says a word in his behalf, no one recalls his holy life, 
no one speaks of the sublimity of his doctrine nor the 
good he has done ; all desire his death without having 
even the shadow of a reason, without even being able to 
convict him of any fault or of any violation of the law ; — 
" and this,'' says St. Augustine, " is their great iniquity, 
for it is at this moment that he might again say to them : 
' Many good Avorks I have shown to you from my father ; 
for which of these works do you take my life V "* 

But no ! he repeats not these words because his hour 
is come. 

Voluntary victim of the great sacrifice, he remains 
calm and silent : he offers himself to his divine Father 
as the hostage for our reconciliation with heaven ; he 
merits for the holy martyrs and confessors of the faith 
that superhuman strength and courage which they are 
to display, in the course of ages, before tyrants and 
executioners. 

* St. John. x. 32. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 77 

APPLICATION. 

Let us pay our homage to Jesus our divine Savior, 
let vis adore him as king and chief of the martyrs ; and 
pray him, by what he suffered at the tribunal of 
Caiaphas, to give us the strength and courage of which 
we have need to persevere to the end in the accomplish- 
ment of the duties of our state. 

Let the consideration of the perversity of the enemies 
of Jesus inspire us with the greatest horror of all 
hypocrisy ; let us be always free and sincere ; let us 
be what we ought to be before God and before men. 
Let us be very careful never to make pretence of the 
interests of religion to gratify our personal resentment. 

Let us, while placing before our eyes the picture of 
his sorrows, excite ourselves more and more to gratitude 
towards Jesus who, being the son of God and equal to 
God, devoted himself for us even to making himself the 
victim of our redemption. Let us think that he endures 
them only for us, and to deliver us from the everlasting 
torments we have deserved. Let us try, then, to com- 
prehend what he has done for our salvation, and to 
return him devotion for devotion, love for love. 

Let his example lead us to the practice of patience 
and mortification ; let us propose to ourselves to offer 
to God, his Father, some sacrifice in the course of this 
day, in union with what he suffered at the tribunal of 
Caiaphas : and in order to facilitate to ourselves the 
accomplishment of what we have resolved upon, let us 
imagine that we sec him in presence of his enemies, 
patiently listening to their calumnies, and for our sake 
bearing all the ill-treatment. 



78 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

PRAYER. 

I behold you there, at the feet of Caiaphas, O Jesus ! 
and I sep you throttled as a criminal, — you the pon- 
tiff of pontiffs, who art innocence and sanctity them- 
selves. What confusion you feel, my God ! and what 
can there be more fit to confound my pride and all my 
susceptibility ! 

I can bear nothing, and yet I call thee my master 
and my model, — thou who didst drain to the dregs the 
chalice of humiliation. 

Oh ! Lord, I blush in thy presence for the incon- 
sistency of my conduct, and I propose to conduct 
myself for the future in a manner truly conformable to 
the example thou hast given me ; I will often recall it 
to my mind during this day, and if there is any thing 
to be suffered, I will contemplate thee appearing before 
thine enemies ; and that contemplation, exciting in my 
heart, by thy grace, the desire of becoming like unto 
thee, will render me patient in adversity and disposed 
to bear all for thy sake. 

(See Resumes, page ^88.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 79 

FOURTEENTH MEDITATION. 
JESUS RECEIVES A BLOW, 



One of the officers standing by gave Jesus a blow. 
St. John, xviii. 22. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us contemplate, Christian souls ! our divine Savior 
standing in the midst of the great council of the Jews, 
of that assembly of proud Pharisees who regard him 
with contempt, who treat him as a man of no account, 
as a false prophet, a seducer, — He, the Grod by whom 
all subsists, the promised Messiah, and holiness 
itself! 

Let us admire him listening mildly and in silence to 
his enemies. They put a multitude of questions to him, 
for the purpose of ensnaring him, and so obtaining 
some cause of accusing and condemning him ; but he 
ddes not see fit to answer them. Then the high priest 
interrogates him on his disciples and his doctrine, 
flattering himself, says St. John Chrysostom, that he 
would find something reprehensible in his words, and 
thus manage to make him appear a seditious character, 
and a dangerous innovator in the matter of religion.* 

The divine Master might, as before, keep silence, but 
he will not do so. It is important that he shall make 
* Horn., 82. 



80 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

known to all that his doctrine is not a hidden doctrine, 
which is only communicated in darkness ; he answers 
calmly and mildly : "I have spoken openly to the 
world ; I have always taught in the synagogue, and in 
the temple, whither all the Jews resort ; and in private I 
have spoken nothing. Why askest thou me 1 Ask 
them who have heard what I have spoken to them : 
behold, they know what things I have said."* 

" One can imagine nothing," says St. Augustine, 
" sweeter, more sensible, or more just than these 
words : " — by them, Jesus makes known to all that his 
teaching has always been public ; that, consequently, 
he never feared its being examined ; by them, he 
appeals to all the people, even his enemies themselves ; 
furthermore, he could not have directly eulogized his 
own doctrine before those ill-disposed men who would, 
as they had already done, have reproached him with 
giving testimony of himself.t 

His answer was then eminently sensible ; but those 
to whom he made it were exasperated because it was 
not favorable to their criminal design ; it was the more 
vexatious to their pride because it was perfectly reason- 
able, and they could find in it nothing to censure : 
hence their spite became visible on their face, and their 
eyes expressed the desire of brutal revenge. 

Then it was that an officer, or rather a vile slave, of 
the high priest, entering into the intentions of the 
members of the council, draws near to Jesus, raises his 
sacrilegious hand, and strikes him violently in the face, 
saying, "Answerest thou the high priest so ?'"' 

* St. John, xviii. 20, 81. t TMd., iii. 13. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 81 

" At sight of this outrage/' says St. Ephraim, " the 
heavens are dismayed, and the angels shudder with 
horror." They were astonished that the earth did not 
open and swallow the wretch who had dared to commit 
an act so barbarous, a sacrilege so horrible ! 

" O indignity ! affront ! " exclaims St. Chrysostom 5 
" can we imagine an outrage more grievous, an insult 
more revolting ? " What ! The King of Glory is mal- 
treated by a vile slave ! The Son of God is struck by a 
base hireling ! That august face before which the celestial 
spirits veil themselves with their wings, unable to bear 
its splendor, is bruised by the hand of a wretched 
mortal ! . . . And it is before the first of tribunals that 
this crime is committed with impunity ! it is com- 
mitted in presence of the pontiff of the law and by one 
of the people attached to his service ! 

Even if this wretch had given this blow to one of his 
equals, he would have been most culpable ; if he had 
given it to an earthly sovereign, he would have com- 
mitted a crime of high treason, incurring the full 
severity of the law : — by what name could we, then, 
designate his crime, in having dared to strike the Son 
of God himself, and what punishmeut could be justly 
awarded to him ? 

But let us not limit ourselves to exciting in our 
hearts sentiments of indignation against this sacrilegious 
servant and the members of the iniquitous tribunal 
which authorizes his crime ; let us cast ourselves at the 
feet of our adorable Savior to make reparation to him. 

Let us also beg of him to make known to us the 
motives from which he resigned himself to be buffeted 



82 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

in a manner so cruel and so humiliating. Let us hear 
him tell us that he bore that outrage that we might con- 
ceive what grief and what shame are caused him by 
the conduct of those who are ashamed of him and his 
religion, who refuse to acknowledge him as their God, 
and to pay him the homage of their heart ; let us hear 
him tell us that he endured it in order to expiate our 
pride and our sins of human respect, as well as to excite 
us to follow him courageously in the way of his humilia- 
tions, and to merit that grace for us. 

Oh! what an example he gives us on this occasion, 
when he presents his face to be buffeted, while, waiting 
to present his whole body to the blows of the execu- 
tioners ; when, without complaining, without murmur- 
ing, he suffers the greatest of all insults] 

If he speak, it is not to address reproaches to the 
cruel man who has struck him, but to make him enter 
into himself and bring him to a salutary repentance; it 
is to give a useful lesson to the high priest and the 
other members ef the Council; it is to prove that being 
a faithful observer of the law he has come to accomplish, 
he had always given an example of the greatest respect 
towards the high priest ; that, having nowise deserved 
this punishment, he endured the blow for us, the true 
criminals, who ought, on account of our want of 
respect to God, to be treated with the greatest con- 
tempt, and that for all eternity. 

APPLICATION. 

Let us, then, understand the precious teachings which 
our divine Master gives us by his acts and by his 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 83 

words ; let us learn of him that he is really meek and 
humble of heart, and beg of him the grace to imitate 
him, to suffer, like him and for his sake, everything 
painful, annoying, and humiliating, that may happen to 
us. 

" By what right," says St. Athanasius, " would we 
dare, sinners as we are, to complain of the injustice of 
our brethren to us, since we see the son of God, inno- 
cence itself, bear with so much patience, through love 
for us, the atrocious insult offered him by men 1 " No, 
no ! let us not be jealous of the esteem of our fellow- 
beings, nor susceptible on the point of honor ; if we 
would really be disciples of Jesus Christ, let us imitate 
his meekness, let us bear patiently and for his sake the 
injustice of those who have, in common with us, the 
nature of man, the condition of slave, the sad quality of 
sinners. 

Let us thank, with our whole heart, the adorable 
Jesus for having endured so great an injury in order 
to expiate our sins of pride, and to preserve us from 
the eternal confusion we have deserved by our prevari- 
cations. 

Let us be his, entirely his, and let us give him a 
proof thereof by avoiding with the greatest care all that 
may be displeasing to him. Let us remember that 
every sin is an outrage infinitely more sensible to his 
tender heart than the blow he received at the tribunal 
of ( iaiaphas. Let us therefore sin no more ; and let us, 
by our fidelity, make him forget all the faults we have 
had the misfortune to commit up to this day. 



84 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

PRAYER. 

most kind Jesus ! who not only turnest not away 
thy face from the wretch who strikes thee a blow, but 
who regardest him with eyes full of charity and offerest 
him the kiss of reconciliation, neither turn it away 
from me who have, alas ! so cruelly struck thee by my 
sins. Look upon me in thy charity, and forgive me. 

Grant also, by thy grace, that I may imitate thy 
meekness ; that, walking in thy footsteps, I may resign 
myself, for thy sake, to all the humiliations it may 
please thee to send me, and that I may never allow into 
my heart any other sentiments than those of resignation, 
patience, and forgiveness of injuries. 

(See Resumes, page 388.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 85 

FIFTEENTH MEDITATION. 
JESUS ACCUSED BY FALSE WITNESSES. 



The chief priests, and the council, sought false witnesses 
against Jesus." — St. Matt., xxvi. 59. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us consider with horror to what a degree of 
wickedness the enemies of our divine Master have de- 
scended ; they propose to themselves the most iniquitous 
end — they act on the most depraved sentiments — 
they employ the most unjust means. 

The end they have in view is to malign and put to 
death Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the Supreme King, 
whose sanctity they nevertheless know, and from whom 
they have ever received only benefits ; it is to annihi- 
late, as far as they possibly can, his doctrine and his 
honor ; it is to destroy the work of salvation which he 
came to accomplish. Can any thing more criminal be 
conceived 1 

And why do they form this design 1 What motives 
incite them to it, if not envy and jealousy, the basest 
and worst of passions ? The devils have got the mastery 
of their hearts ; wherefore it is that they share in the 
hatred of those malignant spirits for the Just by excel- 
lence, and in their desire to see him humbled and put to 
death. 



86 MEDITATIONS OX THE PASSION 

Under the control of these vicious sentiments, and in 
order to attain their end, they employ the most odious 
means : already have they called in treachery, hypo- 
crisy, violence, and behold ! they now have recourse to 
falsehood and perjury : " The chief priests and the 
whole council sought false witnesses against Jesus that 
they might put him to death."* 

Behold, then, judges who, obliged by their office to 
punish false witnesses, on the contrary seek them out, 
incite them to come and perjure themselves, and not 
only promise them impunity, but oven rewards, if their 
deposition make it possible, to pass sentence of death 
on Jesus. What a subversion of all order ! What incredi- 
ble malice ! 

( > iniquitous judges ! you seek false witness, and why ? 
Ah ! we know ; it is because truthful witnesses would 
not depose against him whose unjust condemnation you 
desire ; it is because only the most audacious falsehood 
can criminate him who is innocence, holiness itself; it 
is because you would fain give the greatest error that 
ever was, a semblance of truth ; it is because you would 
veil under judicial forms the deicide you are about to 
commit ; it is because you would first kill by calumny, 
in public estimation, him whom you want an excuse to 
deliver to the executioners ; it is because the life of the 
Just One is displeasing to you, and you would fain 
persuade yourselves and others that he is not just. 

Besides, your base act is written in the books of 
which you are the interpreters : " Unjust witnesses 
have risen up against me,"t said David, " the image of 
* St. Matt., xxvi. 59. t Ps.. xxvi. 12. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 87 

the Messiah;" "but," he elsewhere says, "let my 
enemies be confounded and ashamed."* 

Now, this is precisely Avhat happens at the tribunal of 
Caiaphas ; the evidence, far from establishing any facts 
against Jesus, does but reveal the infamous plot to which 
recourse has been had. Amongst so many calumniators 
not one can bring home to him even the slightest trans- 
gression ; many contradict what others have said ; and 
so this whole intrigue results only in manifesting the 
innocence of the Accused and the malice of his 
enemies. 

" O triumph of the innocence of Jesus ! " exclaims 
Origen j " amid all these suborned witnesses, calumny 
finds not even the slightest thing to make use of against 
him ! " 

Nevertheless two witnesses present themselves, and 
affirm that he said : "I am able to destroy the temple 
of God, and in three days to rebuild it."t This was a 
grave accusation, but it was also a false one ; and hence 
it is that the Gospel styles those who bore it, " false 
witnesses." 

It was grave, because it was meant to ruin Jesus in 
the opinion of the Jews, so jealous of the glory of their 
temple, and in whose eyes to speak against that edifice 
was to speak against the nation itself, of which it was, as it 
were, a symbol. In causing Jesus to be accused of having 
a design to destroy it, Caiaphas took therefore the most 
infallible means of prejudicing the people against the 
victim of his envy. 

But this accusation was false ; — our divine Savior 
* Ps., xxxix. 15; lxix. 3. t St. Matt., xxvi. 61. 



88 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

had said, speaking of his body, " destroy this temple :"* 
but, distorting the meaning of his words, they affirm 
that he said, u I will destroy this temple." — Thus, by 
a perfidious stratagem, they make him appear to have the 
intention of committing the sacrilege which was to be 
committed by the Jews themselves. 

O perfidious judges ! do you not reflect that you are 
already fulfilling the first part of what he foretold, since, 
in conspiring to take his life, you labor to destroy his 
adorable body, that living temple wherein " dwelleth all 
the fulness of the Grod-head P't 

Ah ! reflect you then, too, that he will accomplish 
the second part of his prophecy ; that he will restore that 
temple after three days, and that it shall be the sign of 
your ruin and your condemnation, as well as the cause 
of his glory and the souree of his triumph. But, no! 
blinded by your passions, you think only of carrying 
out your criminal design, to accomplish which you 
shrink from no crime, not even perjury. 

For us, who contemplate our Savior and our God in 
presence of the iniquitous judges before whom he 
appeared, let us consider him, listening in silence to the 
accusations of his enemies, refuting not the calumnies 
wherewith they brand him, not even that whereby they 
render him odious to the people. 

It would have been easy for him to establish his inno- 
cence directly ; for, had he wished it, the sick whom he 
had cured, the possessed whom he had delivered, the 
dead whom he had raised, the angels themselves, as 
well as the saints of the Old Law, — would have come 
* St. John, ii. 19. + Co!., ii. 9. 



OP OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 89 

forward to say to all the people : " This is the Messiah, 
the Christ, Son of the living God." 

But such is not his will: he consents to pass for a 
malefactor, in order to expiate our sins of pride, our 
inordinate desire for the esteem of men. Standing 
before the tribunal of Caiaphas, he appears as though 
sunk in the most profound humiliation. He gives us 
at this moment a great example of patience and resig- 
nation ; his heart is breaking with grief on hearing the 
blasphemies of the infamous people who appear as wit- 
nesses ; but, always full of charity, it only inspires him 
to pity and to pray for them. 

APPLICATION. 

We make profession of being disciples of Jesus Christ ; 
let us, then, imitate him as perfectly as we can. 

Contrary to the conduct of his enemies, let us only 
propose to ourselves a meritorious object ; let us seek only 
the glory of God and the salvation of souls 5 let us act 
only through the pure motives of faith and charity ; let 
us employ only legitimate means, remembering that Ave 
are not allowed to do even fhe slightest evil, were it to 
result in the greatest good. 

Let us take care of allowing ourselves, through envy 
or any other motive, to examine maliciously the actions 
of others. Let us be persuaded that it would be imitat- 
ing the guilty Jews, and seeking witness against our 
brethren, in order to put them to death in our own 
estimation. 

Let us adore Jesus Christ, holiness itself, a prey to 
calumny, and opposing thereto only silence, resignation, 



90 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

and charity. Let us not be suprised if we chance to be 
the object of detraction ; let us only think of bearing- it 
as true disciples of the divine Master. 

PRAYER. 

Is there any thing- more admirable, Jesus! than the 
silence thou keepest whilst thine enemies calumniate 
thee, say all that is evil of thee, misconstrue thy words. 
and utter blasphemies that fill thy soul with grief? 
Thou art as one deaf and dumb. And why, Lord, 
dost thou aet so . ; Ah ! it is to teach me to bear with 
patience and resignation the contradictions, the re- 
proaches, the malicious remarks, the false accusations 
which attack my reputation. 

Give me, then, my divine Master ! thy spirit of 
meekness, t<> the end that I may imitate thee in those 
so trying circumstances, and that I may be truly the 
disciple of him whom I so often invoke in these words : 
" Jesus ! hated, calumniated, and persecuted, have 

(See Resumes, page 389.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 91 



SIXTEENTH MEDITATION. 

JESUS IS CONDEMNED AT THE TRIBUNAL 
OF CAIAPHAS. 



What think you ? But they answering, said : He is guilty of 
death."— St. Matt., xxvi. 66. 



CONSIDERATION. 

The false witnesses have borne testimony against 
Jesus, and he has heard their evidence without replying, 
and it is evidently of no value. Nevertheless, Caiaphas, 
desirous of turning it to account, interrogates the divine 
Prisoner concerning it, but he remains silent. Then, 
being exasperated, and determined to make him say 
something that might criminate him, he said to him : 
" Answerest thou nothing to the things which these 
witness against thee ? "* 

Vain hope ! Jesus answers nothing ; what necessity 
was there for his refuting testimony that was clearly false 
or of no importance, and, moreover, contradictory? 

Caiaphas, and the doctors of the law, vexed to see 
all these diabolical expedients without effect, sought 
amongst themselves new stratagems to ensnare Jesus. 

Unhappy men ! they understood not that failure in 
crime is a grace, and that if God permits nothing to 
prosper with them, it is because he wishes to open 
* St. Matt. sxvi. 62. 



92 iMEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

their eyes and bring them back to the way of good. But 
alas ! instead of yielding to the evidence of facts, they 
again seek means whereby to force the Savior to break 
at last that silence which disconcerts them. 

Then Caiphas conceives the plan of adjuring him in 
the name of the living God, to tell if he is truly the 
Messiah. He hopes that he will not refuse to speak 
when formally commanded in the name of God, and by 
the supreme pontiff. 

This project was sacrilegious and supremely iniqui- 
tous, since it was making use, as a means for crime, of 
the holy name of God, and the pontifical dignity ; and, 
in order to succeed, the questioner counted on tin- 
religion even of him who was about to be put to death 
as wanting religion. They hope to ruin him by means 
of the infinite respect he has for the name of God : can 
anything more odious or more criminal be conceived f 

The high priest then, rising up, said to him in a tone 
of authority : " I adjure thee, by the living God, that 



coidd it be more perfidious : — if Jesus, who says he is 
the Messiah, denies that he is God, he will be convicted 
of having deceived the people ; if he answer in the 
affirmative, he will be accused of blasphemy ; he can, 
therefore, furnish only a sword for his executioners to 
immolate him, unless he answer in an evasive manner. 
But such is not now his intention. He will answer, 
because it is the head of the nation, it is the council of the 
ancients, it is the whole people to whom he was first 
* St. Matt. xxvi. 63. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 93 

sent as ambassador, that summon him to declare plainly 
who he is ; besides, he thinks it a duty to himself, to 
the Church, and to us, to declare openly on this occa- 
sion that he is the Messiah, the Son of God. 

But first he shows that he knows the secret intentions 
of Caiaphas, who interrogates him — not to know the 
truth, but merely to find an opportunity of condemning 
him — wherefore it is that he says ; u If I shall tell you, 
you will not believe me . . . nor let me go,"* because 
I read in your heart that you have resolved, not to 
admit the truth Avhich I am about to reveal, but to 
combat, and make a crime of it. I am going to answer, 
nevertheless, not because of your summons, the malice 
of which I know, but on account of God, in whose name 
you make it. Yea, thou hast said it, I am the Son of 
God. 

O Jewish nation ! behold he declares himself the 
Christ sent by God ! u How long dost thou hold our souls 
in suspense % "f hadst thou said to him. Well ! the 
moment is come when that suspense is to cease. The 
Messiah, the Son of God, is the Son of Man who is a 
prisoner, loaded with chains, and whose death you seek. 

unhappy people ! let not the state in which you see 
him, be to you a cause of scandal. Listen rather to 
the words he speaks, addressing Caiaphas and the whole 
assembly : " You shall see the Son of Man sitting on 
the right hand of the power of God, and coming with 
the clouds of heaven. "| Thus this divine Savior 
transports the thoughts of all from the unworthy tri- 

* St. Luke, xxii. 67, 68. t St. John, x. 24. 

t St. Mark, xiv. 62. 



94 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

bunal before which he stands, to the judgment seat of 
God, where all injustice will be repaired ; he reveals 
himself as the supreme arbiter who shall one day decide 
the fate of his judges themselves. 

Jesus has then declared that he is the son of God, 
and he has done so to render homage to truth, to glorify 
his Father, to edify his Church. He knows that it will 
cost him his life, but he has not hesitated. Let us 
then adore in him, Christian souls ! the chief of the 
martyrs appearing before the first persecutors, entering 
on the career in which he shall be followed by millions 
of the faithful, who will confess that he is truly the Son 
of God, although that declaration is to draw down upon 
them the most rigorous torments and the most cruel 
death. 

As soon as Caiaphas has heard the reply of Jesus, 
he makes a show of hypocritical indignation ; he rends 
his garments, and cries out : "He hath blasphemed ; what 
further need have we of witnesses V 7 * And the whole 
assembly decrees that Jesus is deserving of death. 

O iniquitous sentence ! Jesus is condemned because 
lie has said : " I am the son of God. " But before 
pronouncing against him, have they examined whether 
Ids wisdom is not divine, whether his works are not 
supernatural, whether his power has not shown itself 
infinitely superior to that of men and to that of hell ? 
Have they opened the prophecies to study whether 
they do not tell that he is to be in the state to which he 
is reduced? The devils themselves have confessed his 
divinity ; + and the people, — the depositary of the 
* St. Matt. xxvi. 65. t St. Luke, iv. 41. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 95 

promises concerning his coming — accuse him of blas- 
phemy when they hear him proclaim that he is the Son 
of God ! 

Caiaphas, the chief priests, the doctors of the law, 
have the Messiah before them, and they refuse to 
acknowledge him. But, O judgment of God ! by the 
fact of their criminal obstinacy, they cease to be the 
true interpreters of the law, which was given especially 
to make the Messiah known to men ; the high priest, 
by rending his garments, signified his degradation and 
that of the other ministers of the figurative religion. 
" At this moment," says St. Hilary, " the priesthood of 
Aaron ceases, and that of Jesus Christ is established, 
the law disappears before the Gospel, the veil of the 
Scriptures, figured by the sacerdotal garments, is rent 
before the majesty of the Christian religion." 

APPLICATION. 

Let us courageously confess by our words, and still 
more by our actions, that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, 
that we believe in him, that we are really Christians ; 
and, regardless of the troubles and persecutions that 
)hh conduct may draw upon us, let us manifest our 
belief when the glory of God and our neighbor's good 
require it. 

Let not the sight of our Savior humbled stagger our 
faith ; let us think only that he whom we contemplate 
weak, captive, despised, is now glorious in heaven, 
whence he shall come to judge all mankind. 

Let us be zealous in announcing to those who are 
under our charge, that Jesus is the Son of God, the 



96 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

object worthy of all our love, the foundation of our 
hope. 

Let us console ourselves for the ingratitude of men, if 
we experience it ; let it not even surprise us : Jesus 
had done good to all those with whom he came in con- 
tact ; now, in the great council of the nation, no one 
declares for him ; all the members present in the 
assembly pronounce him deserving of death ; is it fitting 
that Ave should be treated better than our divine 
Master? . . . 
• 

PRAYER . 
I salute thee, and bless thee, O Jesus, King of 
martyrs ! thou who wast sacrificed by the Jews for 
having said ; " I am the Son of God : " that people 
would not acknowledge thee ; but thou hast called us 
Christians, especially us religious, and thou hast said to 
us in the depth of our hearts those same words which 
we have believed through thy grace and thy mercy. 
Augment in us, O sweet Savior ! faith in thy divine 
teachings and hope in thy promises, to the end that, 
animated by the most ardent charity, we may be of the 
number of thy friends on the day of thy glorious coming 
in the clouds of heaven, when thou shalt come to 
exercise all justice, and thyself reward all those who 
shall have believed that thou art Christ, the Son of the 
living God. 

(See Resumes, page 389.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 97 



SEVENTEENTH MEDITATION. 

JESUS IS ABUSED AND INSULTED IN THE 
HOUSE OF CAIAPHAS. 



They spat in his face, and buffeted him, and others struck his 
face with the palms of their hands." — St. Matt., xxvi. 67. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Caiaphas, and the council over which he presides, have 
decreed Jesus worthy of death. They agree to assemble 
again, at the dawn of day, to follow up the affair, and 
retire to take some hours' rest, leaving servants to 
keep guard on the innocent victim of their envy. 

These hirelings know too well the dispositions of their 
masters, to content themselves with guarding Jesus : 
they propose to themselves to have some amusement at 
his expense. Certain of impunity, or rather, counting 
on the approbation of Caiaphas, they carry out their 
intention, and lead Jesus into the vestibule, where they 
make him undergo all that the malice' of their heart can 
suggest, all that insolence and cruelty combined can 
do. 

Oh ! what a sight ! The Master of Heaven serves 
as pastime for wretches! He whom the angels adore 
trembling, is the butt of low and cruel pleasantry ! Who 
could tell what he endures from them ! New Philistines, 
they torment in a thousand ways the true Samson, 



9b MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

delivered into their hands by the synagogue ; they ful- 
filled what had been foretold of the Savior by the 
prophet Jeremiah, saving : "He shall give his cheek 
to him that striketh him ; he shall be filled with 
reproaches."* 

And first, they insidt him by words, treat him as a 
dolt, a fool, renew the accusations of the false witnesses, 
and belch forth all sorts of blasphemies and impreca- 
tions against him. Then they spit in his face, thus 
accomplishing what he had foretold by Isaiah, saying : 
"I have not turned away my face from them that spit 
upon me,"t and what he had foretold himself by his 
apostles.J 

V\ hat torture ! Can we conceive a greater mark of 
contempt, a more outrageous insult, more humiliating 
treatment"? . . . adorable face of my Jesus, splendor 
of eternal light, mirror of God's majesty ! Thou, the 
object of Mary's contemplation, who makest the joy 
and happiness of the angels, I see thee defiled with 
spittle, treated with the utmost dignity! . . 

O mystery of iniquity on the part of men, but mys- 
tery of love on the part of Jesus, who offers for our salva- 
tion this excess of humiliation ! 

The people to whom he hath delivered himself 
through goodness to us, obeying the inspirations of the 
devil, continue to exercise upon him all the cruelties 
suggested by the hatred and envy wherewith they are 
animated. 

Speaking by the prophet Isaiah, the son of God 
said : "I have given my body to the strikers and my 
* Lament., iii. 30. t Isa., 1. 6. ♦ St. Mark, x. 34. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 99 

• 
cheeks to them that plucked them." * Now it is that 
he suffers this torture. . . The wretches to whom he 
is abandoned, dare to lay sacrilegious hands upon him. 
They strike him hard, then burst into peals of derisive 
laughter ; they slap and buffet him, they pull his hair 
and his beard. 

Let us contemplate, with throbbing hearts and tear- 
ful eyes, the barbarous "Sport of those cruel men ! Let 
us behold every soldier, every servant, making himself 
a tormentor of the divine victim, paying him his 
tribute of contempt and ill usage, one trying to outvie 
the other in insult and outrage ! 

The Christ of God, the eternal priest, made the butt 
of ' ruffians ! Insult is heaped upon him without 
measure. Never was any creature, however vile he 
might be, treated with so much ignominy as was the 
Master of the world in that dark hour. 

And yet he is consumed with love even for those 
who outrage him. " He casts upon them," says St. 
Chrysostom, "looks so mild, so affectionate, that their 
hearts might have been softened." But these wretches 
put a bandage over his eyes, and so provide against any 
feeling of compassion. 

In their impious audacity, they scoff at his charac- 
ter of prophet, and show that they consider him only 
as an impostor. They surround him, and some of them 
striking him, say : " Prophesy unto us, O Christ, who 
is he that struck thee !" t 

Great God, to what abasement is thine adorable Son 
reduced ! He to whom nothing is hidden, is told to 
* Isa., 1. 6. f St. Matt., xxvi. 68. 



100 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

• 

guess who struck him ! The name of Christ is only given 
him in sacrilegious mockery. 

Ah ! you do not believe in him — you who insult him 
cruelly — and yet your very insults have been witness of 
his divinity, for he foretold them. Did he not say by 
David f " I have become the reproach of men, and the 
outcast of the people ; all they that saw me have 
laughed me to scorn/'* Did he not say by Job f 
" They have struck me on the cheek ; they are filled 
with my pains. "t 

You are obeying, it is true, the hatred of the 
Pharisees, and the rage of hell ; and, nevertheless, you 
are concurring in the accomplishment of his merciful 
designs. 

Yes, it is his mercy and his love for us that have 
reduced him to the ignominious state in which we con- 
template him. Ah ! if we understood this, would wc 
not love him with our whole heart ? Would Ave not be 
animated with the liveliest and the most constant grati- 
tude to him ? 

APPLICATION. 
Let us love Jesus who has loved us even to sacrificing 
for us his honor and his life. If he endures all the 
opprobium that is heaped upon him, it is to expiate our 
sins, much as they are in contempt of God, or of his 
adorable person and his holy doctrine. Let us hate sin, 
and avoid it. Let us think that, in regard to Jesus, it is 
an outrage intinitely more painful to his divine heart 
than was the cruel mockery of the satellites of Caiaphas. 
* Ps., xxi. 7, 8. t Job. xvi. 11. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 101 

Cet us, therefore, deplore our past transgressions ; let 
us propose to ourselves never more to commit them, 
and take the necessary means. 

Let us attach ourselves with our whole soul to our 
generous Redeemer, remembering that he humbled him- 
self even to annihilation, to deliver us from the eternal 
disgrace we have merited. 

Let us learn from the example of Jesus Christ to bear 
with injuries, to practise patience, humility, and self- 
denial. 

We are his disciples : let us, then, imitate him. By 
times we are discouraged on account of a humiliation, a 
contradiction. Ah ! let us compare what we have to 
suffer with what he suffered for us, and blush for shame 
for having so small a share in the bitter cup he drank 
for us to the very dregs. 

We have considered him filled with reproach, covered 
with ignominy, given up to all sorts of torments : could 
we, then, desire to be honored by men, to love glory ? 
or could we even seek our ease and the gratification of 
our sensuality? No, no ! . . . After the contemplation 
Ave have made, we should have but one desire, that of 
making ourselves like to our divine Master. 

Let us often make him reparation for the outrages he 
underwent daring his passion, and especially for those 
we have ourselves inflicted on him by our sins. Let 
ns repair, as far as it depends on us, the blasphemies 
of the Jews in his regard, and those which impiety 
belches forth in our days against him. 

Let us further draw as fruit from this meditation, to 
respect our neighbor, to do nothing but what is charita- 



102 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

ble towards him — for, in the eyes of faith, our neighbor 
is Jesus Christ — to insult, mock, despise him, is to 
insult, mock, despise that divine Savior himself. 

PRAYER. 

O Jesus ! equally adorable in the midst of the Jews, 
who insult and abuse thee, and in heaven, where the 
angels prostrate themselves in thy presence, we bless 
thee for thy patience during thy sufferings, and for the 
love which made thee accept so much contempt, in 
order to merit for us to adore thee one day in glory. 

Vouchsafe, O my Jesus ! to hear my prayer : since 
thou turnest not thy face from an ungrateful people 
who dishonor thee, turn it not away from a sinner who 
has also often outraged thee, but who at this 
moment has no other desire than to venerate thee as 
profoundly as do the angels in heaven, and who 
urgently implores thy grace ! 

(See Resumes, page 390.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 103 



EIGHTEENTH MEDITATION. 
ON ST. PETER'S DENIAL, 



"•Even this night, before the cock crow twice, thou shalt deny 
me thrice." — St. Mark, xiv. 30. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us consider with terror the frightful faU of the 
prince of the apostles, even three times denying his 
divine Master — even three times, as he himself had 
foretold. 

After supper, when he instituted the adorable sacra- 
ment of his body, that divine Savior said to him : 
" Simon, Simon, behold, Satan hath desired to have you 
that he may sift you as wheat ; but I have prayed for 
thee, that thy faith fail not : and thou being once con- 
verted, confirm thy brethren."* " Simon Peter sayeth 
to him: 'Lord, whither goest thou 1 ?' Jesus answered: 
' Whither I go thou canst not follow me ; but thou 
shalt follow me afterwards.' Peter sayeth to him : 
' Why cannot I follow thee now 1 I will lay down my 
life for thee.' Jesus answered him: ' Wilt thou lay 
down thy life for me ? Amen, Amen, I say to thee, the 
cock shall not crow till thou deny me thrice.' "f 

Speaking to all the apostles, he told them : u All you 
shall be scandalized in me this night, for it is written, 
* St. Luke, xxii. 31, 32. t St. John, xiii. 30-38. 



104 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

1 I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep of the flock 
shall be dispersed.' ' Though all men shall be scan- 
dalized in thee/ Peter answered ' I will never be 
scandalized.' "* 

Jesus repeats the prediction he had made ; but Peter 
replies again : " Lord I am ready to go with thee both 
into prison and to death."t Insisting still more strongly, 
he said: "Though I should die with thee, I shall not 
deny thee."| 

In the garden of Olives, Jesus had recommended his 
apostles, and particularly St. Peter, to watch and pray 
that they might not enter into temptation, reminding 
them that the spirit is willing, the flesh weak. 

The presumptuous apostle, who had protested his 
fidelity with so much energy, understands not that he 
can ever cease to acknowledge his divine Master ; he 
seeks not in prayer the strength that was necessary 
for him, but which he did not think he required. So 
God abandons him to his apparent courage, or rather 
to his real weakness ; he leaves him to his own strength, 
which could not but fail him in the moment of trial, for, 
without the assistance of grace, man has only the power 
of ruining himself. 

Jesus is soon apprehended by his enemies. Peter 
at first takes up his defence, and strikes one of the high 
priest's people, then he flies with the other apostles. 

It is true, he retraces his steps ; but how unlike him- 
self he already is ! " Generous as he had been in pro- 
mises," says St. Augustine, " he shows himself as timid 

* St. Matt., xxvi. 31, 33. t St. Luke, xxii. 33. 

t St. Matt., xxvi. 35. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 105 

now when danger is come ;" he follows Jesus, but afar 
off, as the Gospel likewise remarks. It is, therefore, 
with an irresolute and fear-stricken heart that he 
reaches the house of Caiaphas. He goes in without 
suspecting the peril he is to encounter ; he takes no 
precaution, and seating himself with the servants and 
officers near the fire that had been made, he warms 
himself while waiting to see how the affair would 
end. 

A servant maid looks at him attentively, and thinks 
she recognizes him by the light of the fire at which he 
is warming himself. " Art not thou," said she aloud, 
" one of this man's disciples ? Thou also wert with 
Jesus of Nazareth." At these words he is confounded ; 
his courage forsakes him : " Woman," says he, speaking 
loud enough to be heard by all, " I know him not."* 
" I neither know nor understand what thou sayest."f 

O Aveakness, cowardice ! falsehood ! Of what 
is man not capable when abandoned to himself! . . . 
O Jesus, how must this denial have touched thy 
tender heart ! Thou hadst given Peter so many marks 
of particular affection ! Thou hadst distinguished him 
amongst all, thou hadst chosen him for the head of thy 
Church ; and thou seest him, alas ! succumb to the 
first trial, deny thee for his Master, apostatize, and that 
at the voice of a servant maid ! Ah ! who shall tell us 
what thou didst suffer, and how much thou didst desire 
that thine apostle should depart quickly from that house 
which was for him an occasion of sin ! 

But Peter still remains in the vestibule ; alas ! a 
* St. Luke, xxii. 57. t St. Mark, xiv. 68. 



106 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

moment after, lie denies his Master for the second time 
and confirms his words with an oath ; then, a little later, 
for the third time, and with an imprecation he swears 
that he knows not the man. 

Oh ! how fast we go down in the depths of evil ! 
Peter, who is now perjured, was at first only presump- 
tuous, negligent in praying, then he showed himself 
cowardly in following Jesus, then rash, throwing himself 
without precaution into the occasion of sin; and when 
the moment of trial is come, he feels his imaginary 
strength departing from him, he begins to be ashamed 
of his Master; he declares that he knows him not, even 
that he never knew him. Then, not content with mere 
denial, he has recourse to swearing ; in order to deceive 
more surely, he takes care not to mention this name of 
him whom he denies : " I know not the man," says he, 
" of whom you speak.' 1 * 

O Peter, what sayest thou ? what ! thou knowest not 
the man! And he is thy Redeemer, thy Savior, thy 
God ! Thou knowest not the man ? Thou hast, then, 
forgotten thine own words ; thou no longer remember- 
est the testimony thou didst bear to him, saying, in the 
name of all the disciples : " Thou art Christ, the Son 
of the living God ;t . . . Thou hast the words of eternal 
life ! "| 

Thou knowest not the man ? But it is he who, by 
his power, made thee walk on the waters, and held out 
his hand to thee to prevent thee from being engulfed 
in the waves ; it is he by whom didst make that miracu- 

* St. Mark, xiv. 71. t St. Matt., xvi. 16. 

J St. John. vi. 69. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 107 

lous draught of fish which excited the admiration of 
thyself and those who were with thee ; it is he who, at 
thy request, cured thy mother-in-law ; it is he whom 
thou sawest radiant with glory on Thabor, and of whom 
the Eternal Father spoke when he told thee, " This is 
my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased ! "* it is 
that divine Master who has loved thee so much ! Ah ! 
should he have expected this outrage ? 

Let us not content ourselves with deploring the fall of 
the prince of the apostles ; let us draw a useiull esson from 
it. And first let us be well persuaded that we are only 
weakness, and that what happened to St. Peter may, 
Avith greater probability, happen to ourselves. Let us 
not be presumptuous, therefore ; let us fear for ourselves : 
if the just fell, would it not be folly for the sinner to 
count on himself? 

Peter fell because he neglected vigilance and prayer : 
let us, therefore, understand what power the devil's 
temptations have over the tepid soul, who neglects to 
watch over herself and pray. 

Peter fell for having kept company with the wicked ; 
let us learn to shun the world, to fly those persons who may 
withdraw us from God, to dwell in retirement, to detach 
ourselves, as far as possible, even from our brothers 
if they are not regular : human respect is a terrible 
weapon which makes every day thousands of apostates. 

The head of the Church fell for having imprudently 
cast himself into the occasion of sinning : what precau- 
tions should we not take, — we, frail reeds, who are 
shaken by the first breath of temptation ! 
* St. Matt., xvii. 5. 



108 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

Let us, then, withdraw ourselves promptly from all 
that might tend to our spiritual ruin, or be even simply 
a cause of moral decay. Let us understand well that 
he who exposes himself to danger, shall perish therein ; 
that in dangerous occasions, the mind is disturbed, the 
heart enervated, seduction becomes stronger and 
stronger, and we Boon give way. Alas! how many 
times have we not had deplorable experience of this ! 

PRAYER. 

1 know, my Grod ! that man has in himself neither 
light enough to know the truth, nor strength enough to 
practise virtue ; abandoned to his own resources, he is 
sure to perish. Hence it is that I have recourse to thee, 
and I beseech thee not to have me to myself. 1 deplore 
in thy presence all the wanderings of my life, and I beg 
of thee, through the intercession of the prince of the 
apostles, the two graces thou didst bestow on him — that of 
offending thee no more, and that of bewailing my sins 
till the moment when mine eyes shall close on the light 
of time to open on the light of eternity. 

(See Resumks. page :'.i»0.j 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 109 

NINETEENTH MEDITATION. 
CONVERSION AND PENANCE OP ST. PETER. 



Immediately, . . . the cock crew ; and the Lord, turning, 
looked on Peter. . . . And Peter went out and wept 
bitterly."— St. Luke, xxii. 60-62. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us consider with affright into what an abyss the 
prince of the apostles fell : he, admitted to the contem- 
plation of the greatest mysteries, honored with the most 
intimate confidence, and the object of the most tender 
affection of Jesus ! — behold how, all at once, he has been 
ashamed to have him for a master, and denied him as 
though that adorable Savior had been the vilest of men ; 
and after having, by a celestial revelation, clearly 
recognized and confessed him to be the Christ, the Son 
of the living God ! Oh ! what scandal for the other dis- 
ciples ! What triumph for the Jews ! Alas ! who would 
have thought of such faithlessness ! 

But let us consider with the liveliest emotion the 
infinite goodness of Jesus towards him ; ah ! it is here, 
indeed, that the abyss of sin has called forth the abyss 
of mercy ! 

The crowing of the cock is heard, and that first 
warning has no effect on St. Peter's soul ; it is heard 
again, after the third denial, then the Apostle remembers 
the' prediction which had been made to him, but is not 



110 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

yet converted : for that a particular and very powerful 
grace is required, and this grace Jesus grants him. 
" The Lord turning," says the Gospel, " looked on 
Peter."* 

In these words is contained the whole history of the 
mercy of God ; that look of kindness which they recall, 
is the luminous light which shows Peter the precipice 
down which he has fallen ; it is the hand of the chari- 
table guide who places him again in the way from which 
he had wandered. The look of Jesus is not a look of 
disdain, but of love and compassion. 

Peter ! Jesus loves you still, although you have 
denied him, and have outraged him in a more sensible 
manner then Caiaphas and his officers. He loves you, 
and hence it is that he looks upon you with that look 
which penetrates hearts, and is to you the grace to which 
you are to owe your salvation. 

A look changes Peter guilty into Peter repentant ; it 
is for him a mirror wherein he sees himself all defiled 
with sin, and in a shameful condition. By that look, 
Jesus says to him : " And thou, too, Simon, son of Jonas, 
thou deniest and insultest me ! " By that look, he shows 
him his divine heart, then drowned in tears, pierced 
with many swords, amongst which Peter recognizes 
that wherewith he himself has struck him. 

He then comprehends what his crime is ; but he also 
comprehends that the divine Savior loves him still and 
calls him to him ; he is at once humbled by his sin and 
sustained by grace, desolate and confident, ashamed 
and eager to return to him whom he has had the mis- 
* St. Luke, xxii. 61. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. Ill 

fortune to offend : dead by pride and presumption, he 
is raised again by a look of pity. 

Jesus looked on Peter, " and Peter went out, and 
wept bitterly."* Such are the effects of grace on sinners 
who, like St. Peter, should try to correspond with it, 
bewail their faults, and withdraw themselves quickly 
from dangerous occasions. 

Peter hastens to fly from a house which had been so 
fatal to him, waiting till it pleases God to furnish him 
with the means of repairing, later, the scandal he has 
given; he departs quickly from the occasion of sin, 
and in that, he performs an eminent act of wisdom, — the 
one by which every sincere conversion ought to begin. 

But Peter does not stop there : he gives up his heart 
to the sorrow with which his fault inspires him, and 
sheds torrents of tears. 

Oh ! flow, flow in abundance, tears of that illustrious 
penitent ! you are for him the saving water which 
purifies him and restores to his soul its former beauty ; 
by you he is entitled to the effects of the mercy of God 
and the esteem of men. 

The tears of the repentant sinner call forth the tears of 
thy compassion, Jesus ! and thy compassion is for him 
the forgetting of his fault, the pardon of his crime, hi j 
re-instalment in his privileges, a place in thy generous 
heart, ever full of charity. Thou rejectest not a contrite 
heart which returns to thee, especially when its con- 
version bears such marks as those on which we are 
meditating. 

The conversion of St/ Peter is prompt : at the first 
* St. Luke, xxii. 02. 



112 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

look of Jesus, he re-enters into himself, deplores his 
misfortune, and places no object between the view of 
his crime and his repentance. His conversion is 
prudent : he hastens to fly the occasion of sin, he departs 
quickly from those whose company was injurious to 
him. His conversion is sincere ; tears flow from his 
eyes, but they have their source in his desolate heart. 
He says nothing, because a great grief is always 
silent ; but his tears speak aloud, and procure him the 
efficacy of a new baptism. His sorrow is lasting; ever- 
more penetrated with confusion, he ceases not to groan 
over his sin. Each night, at cock-crow, as St. 
Clement attests, he arose to weep for his infidelity and 
to ask pardon of Jesus Christ ; and that mortification he 
continued all the rest of his life. His sorrow was at 
once so great and so persevering, that his tears, sajs 
NicephoruSj formed furrows, as it were, along his 
cheeks. 

His conversion is fervent: — "The motive which 
makes him shed tears," says St. Chrysostom, " is not 
the fear of the punishment he has deserved, it is the 
regret for having offended his God, for having denied 
his adorable Master, for whom he has so lively an effec- 
tion : " — his heart is at once touched with sorrow and 
penetrated with love : his sorrow inspires him with 
contrition for his sin, and makes him endure a 
martyrdom more painful, perhaps, than the martyrdom 
of blood he was one day to undergo ; his love excites 
his confidence, obtains for him the assistance of grace, 
and makes him find, in his tears, ineffable consolation. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 113 

APPLICATION. 

And we, too, have had, like St. Peter, the misfortune 
of offending Jesus, and on us, too, that divine Savior 
has cast a look of love and purity. Well ! have we, 
like the prince of the apostles, corresponded with the 
favor bestowed upon us ? 

Have we hastened to. fly the occasions of sin ? Have 
we placed our faults before our eyes, to be the subject of 
our confusion ? Have we wept them sincerely and 
constantly ? Have we wept, and do we still weep, for 
them from a motive of love ? Are our tears abundant ? 
St. Peter fell but on one occasion, and he wept his 
misfortune all his lifetime : can we, then, cease to 
mourn — we who have so many times fallen so grievously ! 
" Come, let us weep before the Lord that made us ; " * 
let us weep always, because he is our Father, our 
friend, and because it shall always be true to say that 
we have offended him. 

O tears of St. Peter ! O profound sorrow ! sincere 
conversion ! O model of repentance ! how you condemn 
our superficial sorrow, our imperfect conversions, our 
defective penance, our momentary sighs and tears ! 

Ah ! let us, then, re-enter seriously into ourselves, let 
us excite ourselves to true contrition ; let us have 
recourse to him whom we have offended : our sins are 
our own work, but repentance is that of grace on 
condition we co-operate therewith. Let us ask with 
fervor that grace which will make us return to God by 
way of sorrow, after having withdrawn ourselves from 
him by the way of infidelity. 

* Ps., xciv. G. 



114 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

PRAYER. 

Behold me in thy presence, O Jesus ! confused and 
humbled for my sins ; yes, I know thou hast regarded 
me with the same look of salvation wherewith thou 
didst regard St. Peter ; thou hast reproached me with 
my wanderings, and hast excited me to go to thee by 
repentance. 

But, Lord ! have I corresponded with that grace ? 
After having imitated thine apostle in his wandering, 
have I imitated him in his repentance ? Has my conver- 
sion the marks of his ? Is it sincere f efficacious 1 per- 
severing 1 Is it inspired by love rather than fear ? 

I know not, my God ! but thou knowest, thou who 
knowest all things. 

Ah ! if at this moment, I am not wholly thine, if sin 
yet dwells within me, regard me a second time, I 
beseech thee, with a look of love and pity ; open to my 
heart the precious source of the most abundant graces, 
that they may open to my eyes an inexhaustible 
source of tears ! 

My tears shall obtain for me, through the merits of 
thy precious blood, that thou wilt forget my iniquities, 
and re-instate me in thy friendship and in the privileges 
of thy children. 

(See Resumes, page 391.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 115 

TWENTIETH MEDITATION. 
JESUS SHUT UP IN A DUNGEON. 



" They humbled his feet in fetters; the iron pierced his soul. 
— Ps., civ. 18. 



CONSIDERATION. 

St. Bona venture and several other fathers of the 
Church, assert that the soldiers and servants of the high 
priest, tired at last of tormenting Jesus, and wishing to 
take some rest, agreed amongst themselves to shut him 
up, bound hand and toot in a dark ana* narrow dungeon, 
situated near the high priest's hall of audience. 

Let us contemplate, then, Christian souls, our beloved 
Savior suffering this new indignity, and let us fathom, 
as far as possible, the ocean of grief in which his soul is 
engulfed. Let us behold him in the hands of the ruf- 
fians who have cruelly mocked him, who have heaped 
upon him all the outrages that malice can suggest, and 
who wreaked their infernal fury upon his adorable per- 
son. For a moment they pause, but immediately return 
to him : they bind him closely, they drag him to his 
prison, the door of which they open ; they violently 
thrust him into that hideous den, so low and so narrow 
that he can neither remain standing, nor take any rest. 

There it is that tins adorable Savior, exhausted with 
fatigue, his soul plunged in the deepest sorrow, passed 



116 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

the rest of that night, waiting till the great council 
should assemble anew to confirm the sentence already 
pronounced, and to deliver him into the hands of the 
governor. 

Jesus, most amiable Lord! Avere thy enemies then 
to add this outrage to so many others ? The Just by 
excellence is imprisoned like a criminal ; it is on the 
Holy of Holies and the Master of the world that the walls 
of a narrow dungeon close ; space is measured out to 
him who has sown worlds in space, and who has 
immensity for an attribute ! 

What a mystery of iniquity ! what a subversion of all 
order ! 

Behold, Christian souls ! in what a state your adora- 
ble Master finds himself; his body is bruised with blows, 
his face is covered with spittle, a cold sweat bedews his 
forehead : he is w r eak, overcome with fatigue, exhaust- 
ed, and almost dying. What need he has of charitable 
assistance! but no one gives it. He is a prisoner, and 
no one visits him. His heart is sad and desolate, and 
no word consoles him, no hand dries his tears. 

He is chained in a dark den, where he cannot even 
lie on the ground ; and that is the bed of rest which the 
synagogue has prepared tor him ! 

Ah ! could he have expected to be treated thus by 
the daughter of Sion, he, the King- who came to her full 
of goodness and meekness, — who is really what she her- 
self has acknowledged and proclaimed of him on many 
occasions — her sovereign Lord ! 

O crime ! injustice ! He has come unto his kingdom, 
and his own subjects have given him a prison for his 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 117 

palace, while waiting to be enabled to give him an 
ignominious cross for his throne ! 

But, Lord ! art thou not the all-powerful God ? Why, 
then, dost thou let thyself be dragged into that narrow 
dungeon ? Why allow thyself to be treated as a male- 
factor, thou who art holiness itself? At this moment 
men and beasts are reposing after the labors of the day, 
and repairing their strength by sleep — why dost thou 
not rest ? why dost thou continue to suffer ? 

Ah ! I understand, adorable Savior ! at this moment, 
through love for us, thou art negociating our interests with 
thy Father ; thou art expiating the sins we have com- 
mitted by an abuse of our liberty ; thou art satisfying 
for our crimes, whereby we deserve to be cast, bound 
hand and foot, into the eternal prison, where there is 
only weeping and gnashing of teeth, devouring flames 
and cries of despair. 

At this moment, thou art meriting for the martyrs 
and confessors of the faith the grace to bear patiently the 
pains and the weariness of the prison, and to persevere 
till death in fidelity to thy holy law ; thou declarest 
thyself their chief and their model, and givest them the 
Roost powerfid motives for consolation. 

Oh ! but their imprisonment shall appear mild and 
the chains light, when they remember that thou hast 
deigned to be imprisoned and loaded with irons for 
our sake. 

At this moment, thou also givest us the example of 
the greatest resignation and the most generous forgetful- 
ness of injuries ; thou dost in prison — what soon thou 
shalt do publicly on the cross — thou prayest even for 



118 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

those who persecute thee with so much cruelty and 
malice, and already thou sayest : " Father, forgive them, 
for they know not what they do. r * 

APPLICATION. 

After having contemplated our divine Master in such 
a state of pain and suffering, can we henceforth complain 
of wanting anything, of being ill lodged or ill provided 
for ? Ah ! if we every evening, beside our bed, recall to 
our minds the place of rest which the Jews gave Jesus, 
should we not be ashamed of seeing ourselves, wretched 
sinners as we are, infinitely better treated than he f 

Would not the thought of Jesus Christ imprisoned for 
our sake, make it easy for us to bear the contradictions, 
the injuries, the persecutions even, of which we may 
be the objects? 

What, then ! the God of all grandeur and of all holi- 
ness consents, in order to deliver us from everlasting 
imprisonment, to be chained and cast into a miserable 
den ; and we, who call him our Master — we would fain 
suffer nothing, and murmur at the least trial ! Oh ! how 
unworthy we should be of the name of Christians, so 
glorious for us to bear ! 

Jesus is in our hearts, principally when Ave have the 
happiness of receiving holy Communion ; but is he not 
there as in a prison, hindered by our indifference, our 
self-love, our tepidity, from acting freely to sanctify us, 
and to make of us generous souls for his service ? Is 
not his grace, his word, imprisoned within us, and 
reduced to impotence by the effect of our perverse or 
irresolute will I 

* St. Luke, xxiii. 34. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 119 

Jesus Christ was cast into prison, and whilst he was 
there, he was forgotten and outraged by the world ; but 
is it not the same even now ? Behold him in the holy 
tabernacle, bound, as it were, by indissoluble chains of 
love, outwardly reduced to the most absolute impotence ; 
he is there in the august Sacrament which he instituted 
on the eve of his death, and he is forgotten there, 
alas! by the greater number of men, and outraged by 
many. 

Ah ! what a subject of sorrow for all faithful hearts ! 
what a motive for prostrating ourselves in his holy 
presence, and making him honorable reparation ! 

PRAYER. 

Permit us to cast ourselves at thy feet, august prisoner ! 
wfco, by an effect of thy infinite charity, hast shut thy- 
self up in our holy tabernacles : yes, permit us to offer 
thee the homage of our hearts. The world discovers, 
and even insults thee, in the sacrament of thy love ; but 
we, thy privileged disciples and thy children, we bless 
thee, and pray thee to accept, in reparation of its indif- 
ference towards thee, our most tender affections, our 
protestations of fidelity. 

Help us, Lord ! to repay thee love for love ; ah ! 
may we, by a conduct worthy of our vocation, cause 
thee to forget all we have made thee suffer by our sins, 
and especially this torment of thy imprisoment, occa- 
sioned by the bad use we make of our liberty. 

Jesus ! who dost satisfy for us the justice of thy 
Father, be thou ever blessed for thy goodness in 
making thyself a slave to procure for us the liberty 



120 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

of thy children, and grant that we may not lose it by 
sin. 

O Mary ! by thine anguish during that night on which 
Jesus was cast into a dungeon, we conjure thee to pray 
for us, in order to obtain for us the grace of never more 
offending thy divine Son, our beloved Lord, whom we 
desire to praise, love, bless, and glorify for ever ! 

(See Resumes, page 391.) 



OF OUR LOUD JESUS CHRIST. 121 

TWENTY-FIRST MEDITATION. 
JESUS IS BROUGHT BEFORE PILATE. 



" Tliey brought him bound, and delivered him to Pontius 
Pilate, the governor." — St. Matt., xxvii. 2. 



CONSIDERATION. 

The last night of Jesus on earth in his passion state is 
ended : — the memorable night on which he instituted the 
Sacrament of his love, and gave to men the most salu- 
tary teachings ; but also . the night of sorrow when the 
powers of darkness were all potent against him, and 
treated him with the most revolting cruelty. 

The day begins, and it is that of the greater pains 
and death of the Man-God. All the torments he has 
already suffered are to be renewed, and multiplied more 
and more, and in the most humiliating manner : — Jews 
and Gentiles, priests and magistrates, all are to concur 
in aggravating his sufferings. 

The chief priests being unable, by themselves, to 
have the sentence of death which they had passed on 
Jesus, executed, hasten in the morning to assemble at 
the house of Caiaphas, to devise means for having it 
confirmed by Pontius Pilate. Those unhappy men, 
understanding perfectly that the charge brought by the 
witness they had suborned, would not produce a suffi- 
cient effect on the governor's mind, agreed among 




122 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

themselves to bring Jesus before him as a seditious 
character, an enemy of Caesar, a man who aspired to 
royalty, and who, for that end, sought to make a party 
for himself among the people. 

perfidy on the part of the chiefs of the synagogue!' 
To damage Jesus in the eyes of his fellow-citizens, they 
reproach him with pretended religious misdemeanors; 
falsely accuse him of having spoken ill of the law and the 
Temple; and to have him condemned to death by 
Pilate, they propose to accuse him of being a seditious 
person and a disturber of public order, wanting to be 
made king, and, finally, of having forbidden the paying 
of tribute to Caesar ! Thus it is that they change at will 
the subject of their calumnies. 

They hope to influence the governor, and obtain from 
him not only the confirmation of the decree already 
given, but a new sentence of death, which emanating 
entirely from the Roman authority, would not make 
themselves odious, and which, condemning Jesus to cruci- 
fixion, would deprive him of all honor and esteem in 
the eyes of the people. 

Such are the motives on which the Jews act — crimi- 
nal, odious, iniquitous motives, revealing souls wholly 
under the influence of the spirit of malice. But let its 
turn our minds from them to those on which our divine 
Savior acts. He also has reasons for being brought 
before Pilate's tribunal :— Savior of all men, it is his will 
that Jews and Gentiles concur in the immolation of the 
victim of their salvation ; he desires by an effect of his 
infinite love, to suffer outrages from all nations; he 
r 1 -sires, also, to die the kind of death he announced 



OF OUR LOKD JESUS CHRIST. 123 

when he said, " The Son of man shall be delivered to 
the Gentiles to be crucified.* . . . And I, if I be lifted 
up from the earth, will draw all things to mysel£"f 
Thus he makes the cruelty and malice of the Jews 
serve for the execution of his designs. 

Let us contemplate, then, our amiable Redeemer, 
led once more through the streets of Jerusalem, closely 
bound, surrounded with armed men, preceded by the 
chief priests and the doctors of the law, followed by a 
tumultuous mob, who consider him only as a blasphemer, 
an enemy of their nation and of the holy temple. 

Calumny has turned every heart away from him : 
hence they fear not to take him in the open day, 
assured that there will be no popular sympathy mani- 
fested on his behalf, now that he has been made odious 
to the people. 

Oh ! how humiliating to him is this journey ! What 
shame he feels ! 

He is dragged with a cord around his neck along the 
streets of Jerusalem, every step of which he had 
marked with prodigies ; the people who had so often 
greeted him with acclamation, and who, a few days 
before, accompanied him singing his praises, now insult 
and outrage him, clamoring for his death ; those who 
are near him insult him, to render him more and more 
an object of contempt, and load him with maledictions. 

The more the crowd swells, the more the fury 
against him increases, the more all manner of outrages 
is multiplied. 

Behold, Christian souls, in what a state your Savior 
* St. Matt., xx. 1!». f St. John, xii. 32. 



124 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

is ! he is truly the " man of sorrows,''* and becoming 
more and more " the outcast of the people, "f and the 
olyeet of their derision ; he is truly the divine Lamb, 
abandoned to the fury of wolves, and remaining ever 
mild and full of sweetness. Oh! bear him company in 
this journey so ignominious for him, and by thy respect- 
ful homage, by thy sincere adoration, try to make him 
forget the insults and outrages of which he is the 
object, and which, at bottom, he suffers only for your 
sake, and because he wills it. 

Do not content yourself with contemplating his trials, 
his sufferings, his exterior humiliations, but think it is 
for you he has reduced himself to this state ; enter, 
then, into his heart, see what anguish and dejection he 
feels, and yet what his resignation is in his sufferings, 
and his charity for his enemies : — they all curse him, 
while dragging him before the governor's tribunal j but 
he answers their outrages only by offering up his 
sufferings to his Father for them, and praying him to 
forgive them. 



APPLICATION. 

Let us excite our hearts to lively sentiments of com- 
passion, while considering what Jesus suffers for us. 

Can we remain cold, hard, and insensible, while con- 
templating so many sorrows 1 Can the sight of our 
beloved Savior, buffeted, despised, rejected by all his 
people, led in chains before the judge who is to condemn 
him, fail to penetrate us to the depth of our soul ! Oh ! 

* Isa.. liii. 3. t Ps., xxi. 7. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 125 

why should we, then, show so little love for that divine 
Redeemer 1 

Let us make him honorable amends for all he suffered 
in the streets of Jerusalem ; let us try to glorify him as 
much as he was then despised. 

Let us adore the terrible judgments of God, being 
executed on the Jewish nation by the Jews themselves : 
the divine Word is come to them, full of grace and truth ; 
he is come to be their life, their salvation, and their 
glory ; and the Jews reject him with contempt and 
give him up to the idolaters, without suspecting that 
they are committing suicide towards themselves, and 
are making over to a new people their right to the 
fulfilment of the promises made to Abraham, Isaac, and 
Jacob. 

Let the thought of Jesus dragged through Jerusalem, 
occupy our mind when we pass along the streets of the 
cities where we are employed; let us be modest there ; 
let us bear willingly the contempt and the insults to 
which we may be subjected. What are these, compared 
with the affronts and the bad treatment endured for us 
by Jesus, our head and our model ? Would it not be 
feeling ashamed to resemble him, did we shrink from 
thcni ? Would it not be refusing to be his disciples ? 

Let the thought of Jesus, humbled, annihilated, lead 
us then to the practice of humility : alas ! we are always 
afraid of being despised, condemned by men, — is that 
the feeling that ought to be in us ? A Christian should 
only fear not to be found comformable to Jesus ; and he 
ought to esteem nothing more than whatever may help 
him to become like unto that divine model. 



120 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

PRAYER. 

Jesus ! whom I contemplate ignominously dragged 
through the streets of Jerusalem, grant me to enter into 
the spirit of this mystery, which is, on thy part, a mystery 
of love, and on that of thine enemies, a mystery of in- 
iquity. Grant that, understanding how much thou hast 
loved us, I may love thee, in return, with all my heart, 
and with all my strength : and grant also, that compre- 
hending in like manner all the heinousness of the con- 
duct of the Jews, I may have a horror of envy, hatred, 
and all the evil passions which animated them, and 
which alas ! still live in me. 

1 accept, in union with thee, my Jesus ! all the 
humiliations, all the contempt of which 1 may be the 
object : happy if, imitating thee in thy humility and thy 
resignation, 1 may obtain not to be, at the moment of 
my death, dragged by devils to the foot of thy tribunal. 

Oh ! grant I beseech thee by all thou hast suffered, 
that I may be conducted thither by my holy angel 
guardian, who will ask and obtain for me a sentence of 
mercy. 

(See Resumes, page 392.) 



OF OUR LOED JESUS CHRIST. 127 

TWENTY-SECOID MEDITATION. 
DESPAIR OF JUDAS. 



I have sinned in betraying innocent blood. 
St. Matt, xxvii. 4. 



CONSIDERATION. 

It seems, from the expressions used in the holy 
Gospel, that Judas had not calculated all the consequences 
of his crime ; perhaps he had imagined that Jesus would 
defend himself before his judges, or that, by some act 
of his power, he might escape from the hands of his 
enemies and recover his liberty, whilst he should have 
none the less the price of his treason : but he cannot 
remain under that delusion, now that he sees him con- 
demned by the council of the nation and brought before 
Pilate's tribunal. 

Oh ! what torments he endures ! For him, it is hell 
beginning ; a gloomy sadness veils his brow, his look is 
restless and wandering, his step hurried; a prey to 
remorse, he acts as if he bore a consuming fire within 
him ; he wanders on all sides without finding rest. 

A new Cain, he, too, hears the terrible words : 
" What hast thou done with thy brother ? Judas, what 
hast thou done with Jesus ? The blood of the new 
Abel ascends to heaven, and accuses thee before me." 

More and more agitated, the wret(4i replies as Cain 



128 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

had done before : " My iniquity is greater than that I 
may deserve pardon."* I have betrayed innocent blood, 
all is lost for me ; — and he thinks he hears distinctly the 
sentence pronounced against the first fratricide, " Cursed 
shalt thou be."t Then his agitation is redoubled ; it 
seems to him that he is marked on the forehead with a 
distinctive mark ; he suffers unspeakable tortures. 

O sad example of the deceptions experienced by the 
wicked ! Judas had doubtless promised himself precious 
advantages from his treason; he hoped that the thirty 
pieces for which he delivered up Jesus, would procure 
him some enjoyment. Alas ! scarcely has he them in 
his possession when he feels pain on pain, and they 
appear to him as a crushing weight, or rather as burning 
coals of fire. 

Let us behold him rising in haste, taking that 
treasure he had so coveted, and carrying it to the tem- 
ple ; there he offers it to the chief priests and tells 
them : "I have sinned in betraying innocent blood — n 
take back the price of my treason. 

Vain step ; those wretches, more audacious than he, 
spurn him with contempt : "What is that to us ? look 
thou to it, "| they reply ; then they turn away, and will 
not even listen to him any more. At these words, 
Judas feels the torments of his soul increase ; he sees 
more clearly all the blackness of his crime ; the disdain with 
which he is treated by his accomplices, makes him also 
understand that he has become forever odious to the 
whole world ; he knows that God has cursed him ; he 

* Gen., iv. 13. t IhUL, iv. 11. 

• J St. Matt., xxvii. 4. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 129 

reads in every eye contempt and horror ; it seems to 
him that the disciples and all his acquaintances reproach 
him with his infamous deed, that men and angels fly 
from him, giving him the name of traitor. 

It is all over, said he to himself, casting down on the 
flags of the temple the thirty pieces he had received, — I 
shall find rest no more ; lost to honor, I shall meet no 
one who has any esteem or even pity for me. 

Thou art mistaken, O Judas! there is one whose 
goodness is greater than thy malice.; there is one heart 
that still pities thee, one heart that loves thee. 

Ah ! come then, and prostrate thyself before thy 
divine Master ; weep for thy crime and solicit pardon, 
and thou shalt see Jesus open to thee his merciful arms, 
press thee to his bosom, calling thee his son, and give 
thee the kiss of peace, which can alone cure thee of the 
ills thy perfidious kiss has brought upon thee. 

If thou dost not dare to go to him, address thyself to 
his most holy Mother, — she will still obtain mercy for 
thee. 

But no ! Judas is going neither to Jesus nor Mary ; 
he allows himself to fall into despair ; his mind is dark- 
ened, his imagination only presents him with dismal 
images, his heart is a prey to rage, and, becoming as 
cruel to himself as he had been to his divine Master, he 
puts the seal on his reprobation by putting himself to 
death : from his hideous body his bowels burst forth, 
whilst his impure soul is carried to "his place" by 
devils ! 

sad end ! deplorable terminus of crime ! Ah ! if 
thou wert but known, would any one dare to commit it ? 



130 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

APPLICATION. 

Christian souls ! who shudder at the thought of the 
misfortune of Judas, let us fear and adore the judg- 
ments of God, comprehending to what excess an un- 
bridled passion may lead. 

Let us not count on our own strength, nor even on 
the means of sanctiheation at our disposal — Adam 
sinned in the terrestrial Paradise, Judas became a devil 
even in the company of our Lord. 

Let us not forget that this wretch fell not all at once : 
he began by faults less, perhaps, than those which we 
allow ourselves, and he came to sacrilege, to deicide, to 
despair. Who can assure us that our shortcomings 
will not end in our ruin '. 

Let us be faithful, then, in the smallest things ; let 
us remain united to our Lord by prayer, by charity ; 
let us not separate ourselves from our brethren; let us 
shun the world, let us also shun those who would lead 
us to laxity : it is on these conditions that we shall remain 
disciples of Jesus, and avoiding the misfortune of Judas, 
we shall not compel our Grod to say of us: " His place 
let another take."* 

Let us maintain in our souls, the most entire confidence 
in the goodness of God ; let us remember that the most 
sensible outrage we can inflict on the heart of Jesus, is 
to doubt his mercy. Ah ! whatever may be our sins, 
let us think that he wishes to forgive them, provided we 
have a true repentance for them. 

Let us derive a useful lesson from the answer of the 

* Ps. cviii. 8. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 131 

chief priests to Judas : the world and the devil, whom 
those perfidious people represent, solicit us to evil by 
making us hope for happiness therefrom ; and when, 
after having sinned, we are convinced by sad experience 
that their promises were deceitful, they despise us and 
aggravate our ills. 

How many unhappy young persons, led astray by 
perfidious counsels, are told, when their illusions are 
destroyed ; " What is that to us \ look thou to it !"* 

Let a religious allow himself to be seduced by the 
allurements of the world and its vanities, and when 
afterwards plunged in the abyss of woe, he complains of 
having been deceived, he will be told : " What is that 
to us ? Look thou to it ; " why did your eyes look upon 
what they ought not to have seen % Why did you lend an 
ear to discourses which you should not hear ? Why 
did your heart detach itself from God to adhere to the 
creature ? The miserable state to which you are 
reduced is your own work. What are the torments of 
your soul to us ? " look thou to it ! " 

Such shall always be the language of the devil to his 
dupes for all eternity : " Look thou to it," why didst 
thou listen to me ? why didst thou follow my inspirations ? 
Wert thou not told that I am the spirit of falsehood 1 

Oh ! let us never hearken, then, to the suggestions of 
the devil, the world, or the flesh — the example of Judas 
clearly proves that instead of procuring happiness, they 
bring in their train only a frightful legion of woes and 
pains, and are ihn cause of death in sin. 

* St. Matt., xxvii. 4. 



132 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

PRAYER. 

I tremble, O my God, at the thought that of myself 
1 can work my ruin. Oh ! abandon me not, for then I 
should be like the faithless disciple, and, speaking of 
thee, I should say to the world and the devil: " What 
will you give me, and I will deliver him unto you?" 
Alas ! what could they give me ? They have only at 
their disposal numberless evils and the torments of 
hell — and all that would be the price of my treason. 

my Jesus ! preserve me from the misfortune of 
offending thee. If, in the past, I have been of the 
number of those who betray thee, -rant that I may be, 
henceforth and forever, of the number of those who 
love th'ee sincerely, and who consecrate themselves 
without reserve to thy service : this is the grace I ask 
of thee through the intercession of thy divine Mother, 
the assured refuge of penitent sinners. 

("See RESUMES, page 392.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 133 

TWENTY-THIRD MEDITATION. 
CAUSES OF THE DESTRUCTION OF JUDAS. 



Satan entered into him." — St. John, xiii. 27. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Judas was one of the twelve apostles of Jesus ; he 



favors, even the gift of miracles, 
the nations, he had had the power of him who sent him : 
at his voice, sinners had returned to good, devils had 
fled, and the possessed recovered rest. To him, as to 
the other apostles, it had been said : I will establish 
you as angel of my people; one day, "you shall sit on 
twelve seats judging the twelve tribes of Israel."* 

And yet Judas has fallen ; and his sad story recalls 
only a man for ever dishonored, accursed of heaven and 
earth. Ah ! how has that star been obscured ? how has that 
light been quenched in darkness ? how has that pillar 
of the temple of the New Law been overthrown ? 
my God ! I dare not uplift the veil that covers that 
mystery of iniquity. 

Nevertheless, all that is written in the Holy Works is 
for our instruction : that the misfortune of Judas, recorded 
in the Holy Gospels, may be to us, then, a salutary 

* St. Matt., xix. 28. 



134 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

lesson, let us seek the causes of that fall in order to 
avoid them, and so not fall into the abyss into which 
that wretched apostle cast himself. 

The way to evil is easy to traverse, the descent is 
rapid, as experience but too well proves ; nevertheless, 
it is not usually crossed at a single step : in general, it 
is only by degrees that people quit the way of virtue, 
that they become addicted to vice, and arrive, like Judas, 
at the fatal state of hardness in sin. 

Perhaps in tracing it back, one would find that the 
first step of Judas towards evil was a slight infidelity, 
one of those faults which we often commit without a 
scruple, and which predispose us to commit others more 
considerable, till even the greatest crimes would no 
longer frighten us. 

Besides, the Gospel points out divers steps in the fall 
of Judas : — 

1st. A want of charity towards his neighbor. "He 
cared nothing for the poor."* Now, he that loves not 
the poor who are our brethren, abides in death ; and, 
in that state, what could Judas produce, if not the fruits 
of death ? 

2d. A spirit of criticism : — " Wherefore, " said he, 
"this waste? why was not this ointment sold for three 
hundred pence ?"t 

3d. Avarice and theft : — " He was a thief, and hav- 
ing the purse,"| ^vith the money intended to supply the 
wants of all the apostles, he stole part of it. 

4th. Dissimulation and hypocrisy : — He veiled his 
passion under the appearance of charity : " Why was 

* St. John, xii. G. t Hid., xii. 5. J Ibid. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 135 

not this ointment sold for three hundred pence/' said 
he, " and given to the poor ? "* 

5th. Audacity and contempt of the warnings of Jesus : 
— " Is it I,"t who shall betray thee ? he asked ; and the 
wretch had already sold him to the Jews. 

Such are the principal steps of the fall of Judas, a 
fall so great that the very thought of it makes one shud- 
der ! Having commenced with small thefts, having con- 
tinued by hypocrisy and falsehood, and having reached 
so rapidly such a degree of wickedness as to conclude an 
infamous bargain with the Jews to deliver up his divine 
Master to them : — what a subject of terror for all men ! 
what a proof that one falls very quickly into the lowest 
depths of evil ! 

Yes ! the bargain was made several days before, and 
the traitor is seeking the opportunity of delivering 
Jesus to his enemies ; yet still he delays the accomplish- 
ment of his project. Ah ! it is that he has not yet 
reached the height of iniquity. What then ! is there 
any thing worse than his intention of delivering Jesus 
to the Jews ? Yes ! Judas has not yet given himself 
up to Satan by a sacrilege ! 

But, behold, the holy supper is celebrated ; our 
adorable Savior with his own hands gives himself to 
his disciples ; and Judas receives and eats that celestial 
Bread, and thus unites the body and soul of Jesus 
Christ to his own body and soul, which are the abode 
of devils ! 

The sacrilege is consummated ! Woe to him who 
has made himself guilty thereof! Judas is now nothing 
■■''■ St. John, xii. 5. t St. Matt., xxvi. 25. 



136 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

more than the slave of the devil. He arises to go and 
accomplish his design ; he separates himself and forever 
from the society of the disciples ! When one is so 
far advanced as he was then in the way of evil, who 
can prevent him from committing every crime, and 
rushing without even a moment's hesitation on a desperate 
death, and thereby into the eternal abyss ? Is not one 
exposed to forget that there is still remedy for even 
so great an evil— the regret for sin committed, and 
confidence in God's mercy I 

APPLICATION 

Alas ! who would not tremble while considering the 
conduct of Judas ? Called to the train of Jesus Christ, 
loaded with graces and favors, witnessing the sublime 
lessons and example of that divine Master, he is, never- 
theless, lost ; and that, because he was unfaithful in small 
things, and that, little by little he allowed himself to 
fall into faults which appeared light, but which, never- 
theless, disposed him to commit the greatest crimes ! 
Ah ! let us go down into our own heart at this very 
moment, and examine, in presence of Jesus Christ, what 
sentiments reign within us, and whether we are not 7 like 
Judas, slaves of some unruly passion. 

Have we no affection for earthly goods ? Are our 
hands perfectly pure ? Are we entirely free from all 
spirit of ownership ? Does our conscience reproach us 
with nothing— absolutely, nothing— in the administra- 
tion confided to us ? 

Oh ! let us never allow ourselves to dispose of any 
money otherwise than it is ordered or permitted by our 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST 137 



ings in religious poverty have always the most fatal 
effects, and lead directly to the way followed by Judas ; 
whilst the practice of this virtue prevents in their very 
Ijeginning a multitude of faults, and maintains us in the 
good way. 

Let us shun all dissimulation ; let us be frank and 
open towards our superiors : hypocrisy, whatever its 
object may be, is always odious ; God, who is truth 
itself, detests deceit, and abandons him who becomes 
guilty of it. 

Let us hear with docility the admonitions of our 
superiors, let us hearken to the cry of our conscience : 
without this precaution, we shall quickly fall into 
tepidity, and ultimately into obduracy in evil. 

As it was sacrilege that put the seal on the obduracy 
of Judas, let us not finish this meditation without 
examining whether our communions are made with the 
requisite dispositions. Doubtless, we have, thanks to 
God, purity of conscience, but have we the fervor that 
ought to be in us ? Does it never happen that we 
approach that divine Sacrament with tepidity, which 
tepidity, if we combat it not, might lead insensibly to 
unworthy communions ? 

Let us every day ask of God the grace of persever- 
ance ; let us beseech him with all the fervor of our soul 
not to suffer us ever to become his enemies, but to give 
lis the grace to serve him, on the contrary, with greater 
and greater fidelity till the hour when he will call us to 
himself to give us our reward. 



138 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

PRAYER. 

In what a slippery desert am I placed, O my God ! 
and how quickly might I cross the space that separates 
me from the eternal abyss, did thou not hold out thy 
hand to sustain me, and send thine angel to guide my 1 
steps! 

When I think, Jesus, that man is capable of every 
crime, that I may be a Judas, that it is possible that I 
may one day betray thee, I tremble and shudder with 
horror while considering myself. 

Oh ! behold what my soul suffers, and reassure me. 

Grant to thy poor servant the grace to persevere in 
good, to be faithful to thee even unto death. I ask it of 
thee through the intercession of thy most holy Mother, 
whom I invoke, saying to her from the bottom of .my 
heart : Help of Christians ! pray for me. 

(See Resumes, page 393.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 139 

TWENTY-FOURTH MEDITATION. 
JESUS BEFORE PILATE. 



They shall deliver him to the Gentiles." — St. Matt., xx. 19. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us consider how Jesus, after having suffered all 
sorts of insults and bad treatment in the streets leading 
from the palace of Caiaphas to that of Pilate, arrives at 
length at that third tribunal, to be delivered to the 
Gentiles. By this solemn act the people of God, 
represented by the grand Council, renounce the Messiah 
promised to their Fathers, and declare they do not 
belong to him who has been made Priest and King by 
the heavenly Father. 

O unhappy Jews, what are you doing ? to what 
extremity are you going ? What ! like Judas who 
delivered up the Savior to you, you deliver him to the 
Gentiles that he may be condemned to an infamous 
death ! 

You understand not what you lose ; you see not into 
what an abyss of evils envy and hatred are leading you, 
making you deliver unto death him who came to deliver 
you from your bondage, and to make you happy for 
ever ! 

And if it were only a misguided populace who 
demanded the Savior's death ! — but no : it is the chief 



140 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

priests, it is the heads of the nation who are the most 
inveterate against him, who direct the conspiracy, who 
excite the multitude, Avho deliver up their Messiah to 
the infidels. They place Jesus chained in the hands of 
the governor's soldiers ; but they enter into the 
pretorium so that they may be able to eat the pasch. 

Hypocrites, who fear to defile themselves by the 
touch of an unbeliever, and who make not the least 
scruple to compass the death of an innocent man, — of 
him whom they have not been able to convict of any, 
even the slightest, fault, and who, by word and deed, 
has manifested that he is holiness itself! They fear to 
contract any legal impurity, and yet they do not fear to 
defile their souls with the greatest of crimes ! 

Meanwhile, the governor condescends to come forth 
from his palace, and advances towards them ; he con- 
sents to give an audience on the steps of the pretorium 
and there receive Jesus, to hear the charges that may 
be brought against him. 

Infatuated by their hatred of that divine Savior, the 
unhappy chiefs of the Jewish nation had imagined that 
Pilate would condemn him without examination, and 
simply at their request : " They would fain," says St. 
Leo, " make the governor not the judge of the case, but 
the blind executor of their sentence." But they were 
mistaken in their calculation : Pilate does not comply 
all at once with their wishes; he sees in them only a 
crowd of accusers whose assertions he has a right to 
examine ; hence it is that he says to them, " Of what 
do you accuse this man ? " Surprised at such a question, 
and scarcely knowing what charges to bring forward, 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 141 

they content themselves with answering vaguely that if 
he were not a criminal, notoriously recognized as such, 
they would not have delivered him up. 

calumny ! blasphemy ! J esus is called a male- 
factor, he who has done only good to all, even to those 
who desire his death ! What ! amongst that crowd that 
hears the accusation brought against him, is there not 
one to come forward and proclaim the works of his infinite 
charity, saying to all : " I was sick and he cured me," 
or, " I was blind and he opened my eyes ; " or yet, " I 
was possessed of a devil and he gave me rest and 
peace." . . . But no : passion, or criminal tepidity 
made those whom he had loaded with benefits ungrate- 
ful, and no one takes up his defence. 

Pilate sees in the reply of the Jews only a refusal, or 
inability to arrange clearly the heads of their accusa- 
tion ; wherefore he says to them-i— Since you know him 
to be a malefactor, and will not tell me the crimes 
whereof you accuse him, "take him you, and judge 
him according to your law." — "But," answered the 
Jews, "it is not lawful for us to put any one to death."* 

Let us here remark that the Jews declare they have 
no longer the supreme authority, as the sceptre has 
passed from the house of Juda ! It is, therefore, true, 
according to the prophecy of Jacob, that Christ has 
come amongst men ; but it was written that he was to 
be disowned by the children of Israel. 

Let us remark, also, that the Jews substitute other 
charges for those they had already preferred : there 
is no longer question of religion, nor of the destruc- 
* St. John, xviii. 31. 



142 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

tion of the temple, nor of blasphemy — the system is 
changed, and iniquity belies itself. 

" Of what crime do you accuse him?" again asks 
the governor. 

The chief priests seeing that Pilate was not satisfied 
with vaguely formed accusations, and moreover, that he 
did not recognize as a grave misdemeanor the pretended 
violations of their law which they had first alleged, 
began to think that an accusation concerning public 
order and the interests of Csesar, would make more im- 
pression on him — they therefore reply : " We have 
found this man perverting our nation, and forbidding 
to give tribute to Caesar, and saying that he is Christ 
the king."* 

Oh ! what a perfidious choice of lying accusations ! 
1 low all is calculated to bring the governor to pronounce 
the wishcd-for condemnation. 

But what odious calumnies ! Jesus, the prince of 
peace, is accused of exciting the people to revolt ! he 
who said to the Pharisees themselves, "Render to 
Csesar the things that are Csesar's,"f is accused by those 
hypocrites of forbidding tribute to be paid to Caesar ! he 
who fled to the mountain when the people woidd have 
made him king, is accused in the people's name of pre- 
tending to royalty ! 

Such is the perfidy of his enemies. Oh ! how it 
afflicts his divine heart ! 



St. Luke, xxiii. 2. t St. Mark, xii. 17. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 143 

APPLICATION. 

Let us deplore the malice of the enemies of Jesus, 
which is the triumph of the devil. To what a degree of 
wickedness man descends under the influence of that 
spirit of darkness ! Alas ! he would likewise lead us 
thither, if we followed his suggestions. . . 

We have remarked that Pilate had refused to accede 
to the demand of the chief priests when once he saw 
that they were animated by envy ; well ! like him, let 
us regard as suspicious all that is demanded by passion 
of any kind. When we feel within us pride, envy, or 
any other inordinate feeling, let us not act ; let us wait 
till calm is re-established in our heart, and then weigh 
all things maturely before Grod. 

Let us distrust grumblers and all those who speak 
against authority ; it is passion that inspires them : their 
fault-finding ought to be suspicious to us. 

Let us not imitate the Jews who make a scruple of 
contracting a legal impurity, whilst they make none 
of committing the greatest crimes ; and let us beware 
of forming for ourselves a false conscience, which seeks 
always to justify what is pleasing and conformable to 
the interests of nature. 

Let us adore Jesus despised and calumniated ; let us 
compassionate what he suffers from the blasphemies 
uttered against him ; and, by our praises, try to offer 
him a reparation that may console his divine heart. 

Let us think of the manner in which he conducts him- 
self towards those who are taking away his reputation, 
and for whom he has only sentiments of the liveliest 



144 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

charity ! What a lesson for us who cannot even bear 
to be reproved for our faults ! When shall we, then, 
testify by our patience in suffering all on the part of our 
neighbor, that we are really the disciples of Jesus ? 

PRAYER. 

Thou art accused, O Jesus, thou the holy one of God ! 
and thou bcarcst it without complaining : what an 
example of patience thou givest me ! Ah! how far I 
still am from being thy disciple ! The slightest offence 
annoys me ; I can bear nothing : oh ! grant, therefore, 
that I may change my conduct, and that, animated by the 
desire of being like unto thee, I may resolutely embrace the 
practice of humility, and accept with resignation and 
with joy all it may please thee to have me suffer in my 
reputation. 

I beseech thee also, Eternal Wisdom ! to defend me 
against my own passions. I know that those feelings 
blind reason and induce us to take evil for good ; where- 
fore I beg of thee, through the intercession of Mary, the 
grace not to fall under their control, to be ever master 
of m v self, and to act only in calmness of soul and under 
the influence of thy spirit. 

(See Resumes, page 893.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 145 

TWENTY-FIFTH MEDITATION. 
JESUS INTERROGATED AS TO HIS ROYALTY. 



My kingdom is not of this world." — St. John, xviii. 36. 



CONSIDERATION. 

The Jews wishing to damage the Savior more effect- 
ually in Pilate's mind, persist in presenting him as a sedi- 
tious character who is disturbing their nation, preventing 
the payment of tribute to Csesar, and setting himself up 
for king. 

The governor at once suspects the falsity of these 
allegations, for if any such thing had been going on, he 
would clearly have heard of it from the persons who 
had charge of the public safety. He understands that 
they want to circumvent him, and to snatch from him 
an iniquitous sentence ; wherefore it is that he takes 
Jesus aside, to question him on the charges brought 
against him by the Jews. 

Let us contemplate, Christian souls ! our divine Savior 
resigning himself to this new humiliation ; let us behold 
him standing before Pilate, and in the attitude of a 
criminal! What degradation for him who has been 
established by his Father as Judge of all creatures, for 
him who shall one day pronounce the supreme decree 
on the living and the dead ! 

Meanwhile Pilate who does not wish to share in the 



14G MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

injustice of the Jews, speaks with a certain degree of 
kindness to Jesus, and, passing over the first heads 
of the accusation, as evidently false or unimportant, he 
questions him on the third : " Art thou," says he " the 
king of the Jews ! " * 

This question could have been suggested to the 
governor neither by the antecedents of Jesus nor the 
situation in which he saw him — hence that adorable 
Master replies : " Sayest thou this thing of thyself, or 
have others told it thee of me ? "t 

Pilate is astonished at this question by which Jesus 
calls upon him to reveal the motives whereon he aits. 
and he answers with a sort of impatience : Am I a 
Jew? Thy nation and the chief priests have delivered 
thee up to me ; but as I have reason to think that they 
do not tell me what lias actuated them in a measure of 
such grave importance, I wish to learn it from thyself. 
What is the matter between them and thee? "What 
hast thou done," J that has given rise to their 
accusations ? 

O Pilate ! you ask him what he has done, and on 
what account he has been summoned before your 
tribunal. Ah ! you know not, then, what works he 
has accomplished ! Interrogate the sick whom he has 
cured, the possessed whom he has delivered, the dead 
whom he has raised, and they will tell you what use he 
has made of his divine power. Interrogate those who 
have heard him with an upright heart, and they will 
tell you what influence his words had on souls, adding 

* St. John, xviii. 33. + Ibid., 34. 

t Ibid., 35. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 147 

that " never did man speak like him."* Interrogate his 
very enemies : they will testify that they could never 
find aught to censure in his doctrine, or in his conduct. 

Meanwhile Jesus goes on to declare his royalty, but 
first he makes answer to Pilate, he tells him : " My king- 
dom is not of this world ; if my kingdom were of this 
world, my servants would certainly strive that I should 
not be delivered to the Jews ; but now my kingdom is 
not from hence."f 

Let us reflect a moment on this answer so suggestive 
of thought, and bless our divine Master for deigning, for 
our instruction, to transform thus into schools of wisdom 
the very places where he appeared the most humbled. 

At this moment he reveals to the world the mystery 
of his royalty, and declares that it is quite different 
from royalty here below ; that it does not, like the latter, 
require territory, armies, external pomp, and splendor ; 
that it is, consequently, nowise incompatible with the 
state of ignominy to which he is reduced, and that 
even death cannot strip him of it. 

O admirable words ! O truly celestial doctrine ! 
Jesus is, therefore, king, and truly king ; but he reigns 
differently from earthly sovereigns, his empire is specially 
exercised over minds and hearts ; it is not limited to 
such or such a country : it extends to all countries and 
to all nations. 

The kingdom of Christ is not of this world : hence 
the Jews have formed to themselves a false idea of the 
royalty of the Messiah ; they have not taken in their 
true sense the prophecies relating thereto. 

:i: St. John, vii. 40. f Ibid., xviii. 36. 



148 MEDITATIONS OX THE PASSION 

The kingdom of Christ is not of this Avorld : hence we 
have reason to believe that the kingdom is spiritual and 
divine, that it is established in hearts by the power of 
grace, that it is extended by the arms of patience, and 
prospers by the contempt of earthly goods. 

The kingdom of Christ is not of this world : our 
king does not, therefore, promise us temporal ad- 
vantages : his rewards are, like his kingdom, of a very 
different nature from those which earthly kings can 
give. 

The kingdom of Christ is not of this world : there is, 
therefore, another world where he who, at this moment, 
is the victim of the most odious injustice that ever was, 
rules as sovereign. 

The kingdom of Christ is not of this world : but then, 
neither do those who are really subjects of Jesus Christ, 
belong to this world, they have rejected its spirit ; they 
have renounced the pomps and usages of the world, 
which are not conformable to the laws of the Gospel. 
The world, on its side, is in opposition to them ; it 
persecutes them, rejects them with contempt, as Jesus 
foretold to his apostles.* 

The kingdom of Christ is not of this world — hence 
the Jews have no right to deliver that divine King to 
Pilate : what imports to the Roman governor a royalty 
wholly different from that of Caesar f 

Nevertheless, Pilate interrogating Jesus anew, says to 
him : " Art thou a king then ? " " Thou say est that I 
am a king," replies that divine Master. . . . u For this 
r this came I imfr 
* St. John. xvi. 33. 



OP OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 149 

should give testimony to the truth : every one that is 
of the truth heareth my voice."* 

From these words', the governor understands that the 
question between Jesus and the Jews is one of doctrine, 
wherewith the Roman laws have nothing to do. Hence 
he says, with a sort of disdain : " What is truth 1 " And 
without waiting for the answer, " he went forth again to 
the Jews."f 

APPLICATION. 

Let us beware of imitating the criminal indifference 
of this magistrate ; let us hear our adorable Master ; he 
will tell us that he is " the way, the truth, and the life ! "f 
the way by which we must walk to arrive at his heavenly 
kingdom — the truth which we must believe, or the true 
light which enlightens every man that comes into this 
world — the life which our soul is to enjoy. Let us well 
understand that, without him, there is only death — death 
begun in this world by the privation of sanctifying grace, 
death consummated in the other by the privation of 
eternal glory ! 

Let us acknowledge him for our supreme king. Let 
us pay him, with the liveliest affection, the homage of 
our dependence. Let us devote ourselves for his 
glory. 

Let us make him reign in our hearts : let him dwell 
there as on his throne, and let all our sentiments be in 
perfect conformity with his holy law. 

Let us accomplish all he demands of us, and manifests 

* St. John, xviii. :{7. f Ibid., 38. 

t Ibid., vir 0. 



150 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

to us by our superiors. It is by this means that we 
shall attain to the possession of that everlasting kingdom 
whither he calls us to reign with him. 

PRAYER. 

I contemplate thee, < ) Jesus, my divine King ! humbled, 
standing before idolatrous magistrates, seated to inter- 
rogate and judge thee ; but I know that thy royalty is not 
like that of earthly sovereigns, that it is nowise damaged 
by that exterior which appears degrading to the natural 
eye. Yes ! under the form of a slave, I recognize my 
Savior and my God, and T offer thee the homage of my 
adoration. 

Thou callest me to follow thee, thou wiliest that I beone 
of thy subjects. Oh ! thanks lor that choice so glorious 
to me, but grant me to be worthy of it by a truly chris- 
tian courage, and by an immovable fidelity, so that when 
I appear before thee on the day when thou alone shalt 
remain king, thou mayst acknowledge me as one of thy 
faithful subjects, and call me to reign with thee. 

(See Resumes, page 394.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 151 

TWENTY-SIXTH MEDITATION. 
SILENCE OF JESUS BEFORE PILATE. 



Jesus answered him not to any word ; so that the governor 
wondered exceedingly." — St. Matt., xxvii. 14. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Pilate having heard our divine Savior reply that his 
kingdom was not of this world, went out of the pretorium 
to the Jews, and told them : " I find no cause to him/ 7 * 
whereon to condemn him. Then the chief priest and 
the ancients of the people, wanting still to attain their 
end, begin to utter a whole host of accusations to which 
Jesus makes no reply. 

Meanwhile Pilate, as though disconcerted by this fury 
on the part of the Jews, again interrogates the Savior, 
who had been brought before him : " Dost not thou 
hear," he says to him, " how great testimonies they 
allege against thee ? " But Jesus remained silent.f 

Undoubtedly that divine Master was not wanting in the 
means of nullifying the new charges brought against 
him — he could, by one word, bring evidence to confound 
the malice of his enemies — nevertheless, "He answered 
never a word ; " there, as at the tribunal of Caiaphas, 
he keeps silence. 

"What dignity j what grandeur in that silence!" 
exclaims St. Ambrose. What a spectacle is offered to our 
* St. John, xix. (!. f St. Matt., xxvii. 13, 14. 



152 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

admiration ! Behold the Son of God in presence of men 
sold to iniquity : he is exposed to the contradiction of 
sinners, to all the shafts of calumny ; he can with one 
word destroy each one of the charges Avhich insolent 
malice has been pleased to invent : and yet lie hears 
them all in the greatest silence, without bitterness, with- 
out impatience, without emotion. Ah ! could he pro- 
claim in a more eloquent manner his innocence and his 
dignity. 

Pilate himself is surprised, amazed at a silence so 
mysterious, and so wholly unprecedented in such grave 
circumstances. He sees Jesus placed under the weight 
of a capital accusation, and with the prospect of a cruel 
and ignominious death ; he knows that he is innocent ; 
he has heard much of his wisdom and his eloquence : and 
yet he sees him stand in perfect tranquility, uttering 
not a single word for his justification. 

He admires him, and forms anew the project of 
saving him ; but weak, and consequently culpable, since 
he has authority in his handj he dares not openly 
declare himself against the Jews and treat them as 
Calumniators ; only he would wish that Jesus would 
persuade them of his innocence : wherefore it is that 
he says to him in their presence: "Answerest thou 
nothing ? Behold how great testimonies they allege 
against thee. 7 ' But, notwithstanding this injunction, 
Jesus still remains silent, find the governor is more and 
more astonished. 

Let us reflect, Christian souls ! on the course our 
divine Master here pursues, and try to understand the 
teachings to be derived from it. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 153 

"Jesus keeps silence/' says St. Jerome, "because 
he wills not that our redemption be longer delayed. He 
answered all that it was important he should answer. 
He declares his divinity before Caiaphas and the 
Sanhedrim, and his royalty before Pilate. Nothing- 
more remains but to die for the world's salvation." 

Jesus keeps silent, because his word has no effect on 
hardened hearts sinning with full knowledge ; besides, 
what need is there for him to speak, when even his 
judge declares him innocent, and the new accusations 
of which he is the object, are no better founded than the 
others ? Moreover, the clamors, the vociferations of 
the Jews, being the expressions of violent passions, of 
themselves reveal clearly enough the injustice of those 
who give utterance to them ; and thus the more 
immoderate, the more tumultuous their words are, they 
render justification the more useless. 

Jesus also keeps silence, to expiate the faults whereof 
we make ourselves guilty by the bad use of our speech, 
and especially those we have committed in trying to 
excuse our sins. Our first parents excuse themselves, 
and they thereby commit a new fault; we, their 
descendants, imitate them, and like them, we become 
more guilty. Now Jesus in his passion expiates for us : 
it was necessary, therefore, that he should expiate in a 
particular manner that sin of excuse, and that is what 
he floes by the silence he keeps at the moment when 
his enemies unjustly accuse him. He thinks not of 
himself, the innocent one, but of guilty us whom he 
represents ; lie is silent, because our sins are without 

speaking before 



154 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

human justice, because we have nothing to reply before 
divine justice. 

Jesus keeps silence, to exercise the most terrible of 
punishments on his enemies : Behold the last act of my 
vengeance, says God to Jerusalem, in the book of 
Ezechiel : " My indignation shall rest in thee ; and my 
jealousy shall depart from thee ; and I will cease and 
be angry no more."* Well ! this vengeance is, at this 
moment, wreaked on the Jews. 

When Jesus rebuked them for their wickedness, when 
he reproached them with their hypocrisy, with their pro- 
fanation of the temple, it was with a view to mercy, and 
the more indignation he showed against them, the more 
goodness he manifested: but now that he is silent, lie 
accomplishes a terrible act of his justice in their regard : 
he declares them unworthy of hearing his holy word, and 
condemns them to remain in their blindness. 

Finally, Jesus keeps silence in presence; of his enemies, 
to give us all a great example of patience and discretion 
in adversity : in replying not to the calumny of which 
he is the object, he teaches us to suffer, and to forgive 
all the injuries to our reputation. 



APPLICATK )X. 

Let us faithfully observe the rule of silence ! we are 
religious, that is to say, disciples of Jesus Christ by a 
special vocation : — well ! our Master kept silence almost 
all his life, and even at the moment when his reputation 
and his life were at stake ; can we, therefore, do less 

* Ezec, xvi. 4 "2. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 155 

than keep silence in the circumstances prescribed by 
the Rule ? 

Let us often remember that where there is much talk- 
ing, there is also much sin. 

What a lesson for us is this silence of Jesus when his 
enemies defame him by their calumnies ? Do we act 
like him when the malice of men impugns our "honor, 
and every thing is said of us 1 Not to speak of such 
hard trials, does it not happen that we are vexed and 
troubled by a mere reprimand, by the slightest reproach V 
Ah ! it shows that we are but poor disciples of Jesus 
Christ ! 

Let us judge ourselves severely, and beware of trying 
to excuse our faults ; let us remember that Jesus con- 
demned himself to silence to expiate the sin of excuse, 
which is, as it were, the summit of the edifice of crime. 
When Ave have erred, let us confess it sincerely, then 
keep silent and confused before the Lord. 

Let us hear our divine Master when he speaks, and 
put his word in practice, fearing lest he should remain 
in that silence towards us which is the most dreadful 
punishment, and which leaves man in the miserable state 
of blindness and hardness of heart. 

Let us embrace these various practices, with a view 
to honor the silence of Jesus during his passion. 

PRAYER. 

They accuse thee, Jesus! and thou sayest nothing 
to justify thyself, when that would have been so easy, 
and that all appeared to make it obligatory upon thee. 

Ah ! it is that thou wouldst teach us that silence is 



156 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

often the principal obligation of the Christian, because by 
it he expiates his sins of speech, and especially his sins 
of excuse j he maintains his soul in peace during times of 
trial, he edifies his neighbor, he imitates and obeys 
thee. 

Oh ! give me to understand this doctrine, to keep 
silence as I ought in my holy state, to bear without com- 
plaining, without murmuring, the contempt of men, the 
malicious constructions which they may put upon our 
actions : this grace I ask of thee through the interces- 
sion of Mary, thy most pure Mother, whose whole life was 
the faithful practice of the virtues I contemplate in thee, 
and which I desire to possess in order to please thee. 

(See Resumes, page 394.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 157 

TWENTY-SEVENTH MEDITATION. 
JESUS SENT TO HEROD. 



Pilate sent him to Herod, who was himself at Jerusalem in 
those, days." — St. Luke, xxiii. 7. 



CONSIDERATION. 

The Jews, determined to obtain at any cost the con- 
demnation of Jesus, insist on the governor with still 
increasing fury : " He stirreth up the people/ 7 they 
say, " teaching throughout all Judea, beginning from 
Galilee, to this place."* 

Pilate knew well the falsity of this new charge ; but 
he availed himself of it, to try to get rid of an affair 
which began to be troublesome. Having heard the 
Jews utter the word Galilee, he asks if Jesus is a 
Galilean ; and as soon as he has learned that the accused 
is under the jurisdiction of Herod, tetrarch of Galilee, 
and then in Jerusalem, he sends him to him, pleased, as 
it were, to be more able to pronounce with due know- 
ledge of the case. 

The Jews, profiting by every incident to humble Jesus, 
and still hoping to obtain his condemnation, hasten to 
lead him to Herod : they persuade themselves that the 
murderer of the Precursor will not spare the master 
himself; that he who, in payment of a dance, had given 

* St. Luke, xxiii. 0. 



158 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

the head of the holiest of the children of men, will not 
refuse to condemn Jesus whose death is demanded by 
the great council of the nation. 

Moreover, say they, Herod is still more interested 
than Pilate in punishing- him who styled himself the 
Christ-king: the motives that had induced his father to 
order the massacre of the children of Bethlehem, 
dispose him likewise to get rid of a man who is calum- 
niously represented as dangerous to his power : — such 
are their thoughts while approaching the palace, trans- 
formed into a court of justice. 

Let us remark here, and with astonishment, before 
how many tribunals Jesus Christ, innocence itself, is 
brought during his passion : he first appeared before 
that of the two sacrilegious, cruel, and envious pontiffs ; 
then before that of an idolatrous magistrate; and now 
he is brought before the murderer of St. John the 
Baptist. Oh! what humiliation ! 

The divine Savior at length arrives at this new 
theatre of his sufferings. Herod had felt a sensible 
pleasure on learning that he was sent to him : it was not 
that he desired to profit by his salutary teachings, but he 
hoped to see him work some miracle. 

Meanwhile the chiefs of the synogogue renew, in his 
presence, the accusations they had brought against Jesus 
at the court of Pilate ; and there, as in the pretorium, 
the adorable Victim leaves calumny full scope and 
remains silent, Herod himself asks him some questions ; 
but the divine Savior makes no answer. 

Let us ask ourselves, Christian souls, why Jesus per- 
sists in the same silence as before the other tribunals. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 159 

Ah ! it is that here again he expiates our sins of speech ; 
he teaches ns patience, and he wreaks on the Jews the 
most fearful of punishments, in "refusing to speak to 
them. 

Besides he is silent to show that those who, like Herod 
are slaves of an impure passion, cannot understand and 
still less relish his divine Word. That sweet Savior ! 
who accomplishes, and even anticipates the wishes of the 
humble, not only does nothing miraculous in presence of 
Herod, but he says not a single word to him,, testifying 
thus how much he condemns his excesses and his pride. 

That prince does not understand the motives of this 
silence of Jesus, and taking offence thereat, he has only 
contempt for that divine Master. He treats him as a 
fool, a blockhead. Suiting the action to the word, he has 
him clothed in a white robe, through derision, and in 
this state, he presents him as a laughing stock to the 
soldiers of his guard and to all the people. 

And Jesus becomes the object of the most cruel 
mockery, the most humiliating remarks. Every one 
looks upon him as a fool ; every one, in accordance with 
the views of Herod, takes pleasure in loading him with 
insults and affronts. 

Rudely pushed, dragged from side to side, outraged in 
words, pointed at, — the Savior of the world is, at this 
moment, as it were inundated with a deluge of ignominy 
and opprobrium ; all that the fury of the devils could 
invent is made use of to ridicule and degrade him. 

The Jews his fellow-citizens, the Galileans amongst 
whom he was brought up, unite in insulting him in the 
most shameful manner. 



160 MEDITATIONS OX THE PASSION 

And yet he does not complain, he is not irritated ; 
on his face none may read resentment, strong emotion, 
the desire of revenge ; he raises not his voice to 
demand justice ; no, he manifests only the most heroic 
sentiments — charity for men, resignation to the will of 
his divine Father. He prays even for those who insult 
him, and his heart invokes on them all the graces and 
blessings of heaven, in still greater number than the 
outrages wherewith they load him. 

O Divine Word, Eternal Wisdom of the Father! 
who manifestest so much patience in suffering for us all 
that is most humiliating, how thou confoundest our 
pride, our susceptibility, the cravings of our self love ! 
Ah ! that we coidd but understand the value of humili- 
ations borne after thine example! that we could but 
have the courage to accept with perfect resignation all 



APPLICATION. 

In contemplating Jesus outraged, scoffed, clad in a 
disgraceful and ridiculous robe, let us compassionate 
the sufferings of his divine heart, and bless him for 
having resigned himself to so much contumely through 
love for us. 

Let us deplore the blindness of Herod and the Jews, 
and in general of all men controlled by their passions. 
Oh ! to what errors do these disorderly feelings give 
rise ! Let us judge by the conduct of the enemies of 
J esus : they gave to light the name of darkness ; they 
made the word of God an object of derision ; they 
treated as a fool him who is wisdom itself. . . 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 161 

For us who recognize in Jesus Christ our Sovereign 
Master and our Grod, let us try by the. homage of our 
faith and piety, to make him honorable amends for the 
sacrilegious contempt of which he was the object during 
his passion. Let us adore him as the Eternal Truth 
and the light of the understanding. 

Let us fear beyond any thing that could happen to 
grieve us, that Jesus should be silent in our regard ; 
let us fear lest he who is truth itself, should no longer 
make his voice heard in our hearts. Let us remember 
that where the passions speak he is silent, and that 
his silence is for a soul the most terrible punishment 
that can be inflicted on this earth. 

Let us carefully preserve innocence, that white robe 
whereby our soul becomes like unto Jesus Christ : it is 
to inspire us with the love of innocence and purity that 
he permitted himself to be clad in a white garment, in 
Herod's palace. 

Let us arm ourselves with courage against raillery ; 
let us not be surprised if we are ridiculed for our way 
of life, and for practising the virtues of our state. 
What is there strange in our being treated as fools, when 
Jesus himself was, and in circumstances infinitely more 
painful to his tender heart than any in which we can 
ever find ourselves ? 



PEAYER. 

We behold thee, Jesus ! in presence of Herod and 
his courtiers. This is the fourth tribunal before which 
thou appearest : Thou dcclinest no jurisdiction, because, 



162 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

considering thyself as charged with every sin, it is thy 
will to be sent before every tribunal. 

But here, Lord, what outrages thou hast to undergo ! 
Thou art made an object of insult and mockery ; thou 
art treated like a fool ; thou art ridiculed, — thou, the 
Eternal Wisdom, the source of all knowledge, the light 
of all minds ! What odious injustice ! what sacrilege ! 
what blasphemy ! 

My God! behold us at thy feet, to offer thee our 
adoration, and make thee honorable amends for the con- 
tempt wherewith thou art loaded. Grant us, O Lord! 
ever to profess for thee and thy holy religion the 
greatest, the most profound respect ; to accept patiently 
and in union with thee, the humiliations, the contempt, 
the insults of men ; to never forget the white robe of 
derision wherein thou wert clad, and which reminds us 
at the same time of thine innocence, and what thou 
didst endure to save us and to cure us of our pride. 

(See Resumes, page 395.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 163 

TWENTY-EIGHTH MEDITATION. 
JESUS SENT BACK BY HEROD TO PILATE. 



"Herod, with his soldiers, despised him, and mocked him, 
putting on him a white garment; and sent him back to 
Pilate." — St. Luke, xxiii. 11. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Herod, notwithstanding the annoyance caused him by 
the silence of Jesus, and the refusal of that divine Master 
to work prodigies to gratify his curiosity, — notwithstand- 
ing the demands of the Jews who renew their calumnious 
accusations, — does not judge the accused deserving of 
death, but decides on sending the affair back to the 
court of Pilate. 

The chief priests are not well pleased at the king of 
Galileo's decision. Nevertheless they conceal their 
vexation ; they order their satellites to lead Jesus back 
to the pretorium, several of them going before, in order 
to overreach the governor, and snatch from him at last 
the sentence of death he has refused them. 

Behold, then, Jesus, clad through derision in a white 
robe, given up anew to the mercy of the cruel men who 
seek his death, and who make sport of his pains and 
sorrows. Behold him going forth from Herod's palace 
where he has been treated with the lowest con- 
tempt: for the fifth time Bince his arrest, he traverses 



1G4 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION" 

the streets of Jerusalem, and allows himself to be led to 
the pretorium where still greater sufferings await him. 

Fix your gaze upon him, Christian souls ! consider 
him bound as a criminal, clad as a fool in a robe of 
ignominy, left at the mercy of ;i shameless and pitiless 
soldiery, surrounded by cruel enemies thirsting for his 
blood, accompanied by a vile rabble who continually 
insult and load him with abuse ! 

Listen to the frantic cries of the wretched inhabitants 
of that ungrateful city, against him who had wrought 
so many wonders before their eyes, and whose wisdom they 
had so often admired. Ah ! who can imagine what he 
has to suffer during that painful journey ! What insults, 
what injuries, what blasphemies, resound in his ears ! 
What bad treatment is heaped upon him! The crowd 
presses around, eager to insult him ; it tills up all the 
streets and even the roofs of the houses whence he may 
be seen passing along. 

Many of the chief priests spread themselves amongst 
the multitude, and stir up the hatred which hell has 
already kindled in every heart ; the inhabitants of Jeru- 
salem seem to seek but one end — the debasement, then 
the death, of Jesus Christ. 

" O my people," might he say with the prophet, 
"what have I done to thee,' 1 * to be treated thus! or 
rather, what could I have done for thy happiness that I 
have not done .' Is this, then, what I ought to expect 
from thee .' '• Jerusalem, Jerusalem, . . . how often 
would I have gathered together thy children as the hen 
gathereth her chickens under her wings !"t . . . And 
Micheas, vi. 3. t St. Matt., xxiii. 37. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 165 

behold these same children surround me like young 
vultures, easting themselves on the prey which their 
mother, the synagogue, has delivered unto them ! 

Yes ! this is what is felt by the tender heart of the 
adorable Jesus, at this moment when he is rejected by 
the people that was his people — he, the light of the 
world, is disowned by those to whom he was sent — he, 
the Word of Grod, who even in Jerusalem has appeared' 
full of peace and truth, manifesting infinite knowledge 
and infinite wisdom, is now disgraced, buffeted, turned 
into derision, treated as a criminal and a fool in that 
very city. 

That supreme greatness, disguised for our sake, as 
Thomas a Kempis says, is exposed to the insults of an 
insolent mob ; that sublime nobility is publicly mocked 
by the lowest of the people ; that beauty, compared 
with which there is no beauty, is disfigured by degraded 
men ; Divine Wisdom is treated as a fool by fools ; the 
source of graces and blessings is loaded by the impious 
with curses ; innocence itself is cruelly outraged by 
criminals ! What a sorrowful, what an incompre- 
hensible sight ! 

Is this, then, what might have been expected from the 
triumphal entry of that same Divine Savior into Jeru- 
salem, five days before ? He was then hailed as a 
prophet, as an ambassador from God the Most High, and 
now he is insulted without any pity ; he is covered 
with mud after having been covered with flowers ! 

Listen to those prolonged shouts of laughter that 
echo around the adorable Master, that hooting indication 
of the lowest degree of contempt, those confused cries 



166 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

amid which are distinguishable insulting ephithets, 
sharp and cruel mockery : ah ! do you comprehend 
how much he suffers ? 

Examine with compassionate attention his deplorable 
state, his weak and tottering steps, his dying eyes 
where sorrow is pictured in mournful lines ; enter into 
his heart, Christian souls, and say if there ever was 
affliction like unto his ! But examine, also, if there ever 
was goodness to be compared to his : for he curses not 
his enemies, he repays not outrage by outrage ; on the 
contrary, he prays for them, and offers up for their 
salvation the very pains they make him suffer. 

APPLICATION. 

you, faithful souls ! who feel with the liveliest 
emotion the spectacle of the insults heaped upon our 
divine Master, turn your eyes a moment from the 
scoffing, jeering crowd, and fix them on the persons who 
have remained attached to him. Think of the grief of 
his blessed Mother who cannot be ignorant of what is 
going on. Think on that of the disciples who have still 
remained faithful to him, on that of the holy women 
who will soon publicly testify on the way to Calvary. 

Oh ! doubtless, a great number of those who had 
believed in his divinity, still preserved their sentiments 
of respect and veneration, wept over the outrages he 
was made to undergo, adored him within their heart, 
and tried to glorify him the more as they saw him 
the more humbled, the more loaded with ignominy. 
How sweet it is to a soul that loves Jesus to recall their 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 167 

dispositions, to think of the comfort they gave his 
divine heart by their compassion and their pious 
homage ! 

Let us unite with them. Let 'us weep over the 
errors of the enemies of Jesus, and, by sincere adora- 
tion, make him honorable amends for ail the outrages 
he has received from men, and especially for those he 
has received from us ; let us bewail our sins which are 
a contempt of his laws, and even of his adorable pei'son, 
and by which we imitate the Jews who insulted him 
whom the angels of heaven adore, and make it their 
glory to serve. 

Let us derive yet other fruits of salvation from the 
contemplation of this ignominious journey of Jesus 
through the streets of Jerusalem. 

Oh ! how it teaches us in a sublime manner patience 
and humility ! A prey to all contempt, he is silent, he 
suffers all without complaining, and prays for his 
enemies ; he .thinks of his Church, he thinks of us 
whom he calls to follow him in the way of humiliation, 
and for whom he merits that grace. 

How loudly, also, do the outrages offered to our 
divine Master speak of the vanity of the praises and 
plaudits of men ! Five days ago he was the object of a 
whole people's acclamations, and now that same people 
treats him only with the greatest contempt ! Ah ! what, 
then, is the glory that comes from this world ! is there 
anything more fleeting '? 



1(58 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

PRAYER. 

Jesus, worthy object of the respect and adoration 
of angels and men ! accept the homage of my 
dependence, in reparation for the insults heaped upon 
thee in Jerusalem. 

1 unite my adoration with that of thy holy Mother, 
and to that of all those who, remaining faithful to thee, 
deplored the crime and the misfortune of the Jews. 

Jesus, by that white garment, then the mark of 
contempt, but since the emblem of innocence ! grant 
that I may preserve my soul in the whiteness and the 
holy purity thou demandcst of me. 

1 have contemplated thee, overwhelmed with outrages, 
despised, cruelly mocked, and I have seen thee never- 
theless remaining silent and praying for those who out- 
raged thee. Oh ! grant that I may be thy worthy 
disciple ; that, like thee, my divine Master, I may 
oppose only humility and patience to the contempt, the 
abusive words, the mockery whereof I may be the 
object : this grace I ask of thee through the interces- 
sion of Mary, thy blessed Mother, whose most holy 
heart felt, through compassion, the counterpart of all 
thou didst suffer for us. 

(See Resumed, page 395.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 1(39 

TWENTY-NINTH MEDITATION. 
JESUS PLACED ON A PAR WITH BARABBAS. 



Whom will you that I deliver to you, Barabbas, or Jesus, 
•who is called Christ?" — St. Matt., xxvii. 17. 



CONSIDERATION. 

It was undoubtedly with much displeasure that Pilate 
saw Jesus returning from Herod's palace to thepretorium ; 
he knew the innocence of the accused : but he also knew 
that, animated by a jealous hatred of that divine Savior, 
the Jews would not relinquish their purpose of having 
him condemned to the death of the cross. 

Nevertheless, he does not yet give up the hope of 
saving him. With that intent, he a second time declares 
him innocent, and reminds the people that in doing so 
he gave the same judgment as Herod himself, who had 
not treated him as a man who deserved death. But the 
Jews persisted in their iniquitous demand. 

Then a new expedient presents itself to his mind : 
he remembers that every year, on occasion of the 
paschal festival, the Jews ask and obtain the deliverance 
of a prisoner. With a view to induce them to ask that 
of Jesus, he places him on a par with one named 
Barabbas, who, having made himself guilty of murder 
and all sorts of crimes, must naturally have horrified 
flic whole nation. 

8 



170 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

Pilate, therefore, presents Jesus and Barabbas, to the 
Jews and asks them : " Which will you have of the 
two to be released unto you ? "* 

What a question on the part of a judge, a governor, a 
Roman praetor ! It is as though he said to them : Jesus 
is innocent, as I have judicially declared ; you know, on 
the other hand, the crimes of Barabbas ; you know he is 
a villain, a murderer, a disturber of the public peace, a 
man dangerous to you and to the whole nation ; well ! 
I leave you to decide which of the two I shall liberate 

The people, expecting no such proposal, would doubt- 
less have hesitated on the choice they were about t<> 
make ; but the chief priests and the ancients having 
spread amongst them, excited the multitude to ask for 
the deliverance of Barabbas and the condemnation of 
Jesus ; and, in order to secure their voices, they cried out 
the first, " Give tis Barabbas : condemn Jesus." And 
the whole multitude repeated those horrible words : 
" Away with this man, and release unto us Barabbas ! "f 

Let us assist in spirit at this shameful spectacle ! Let 
us behold Jesus placed on a par with Barabbas — the 
descendant of David with a vile wretch — the just by 
excellence with a villain — the only Son of God, the 
Eternal Word of the Father, the splendor of his glory, 
with a robber, an assassin, a seditious man, who, before 
being condemned, was civilly dead by the notoriety and 
infamy of his crimes ! — What injustice, and at the same 
time, what humiliation for our divine Savior ! 

Let us hear what he had said on this subject by the 
the prophet Isaiah : "To whom have you likened me, 
* St. Matt., xxvii. 21. t St. Luke, xxiii. 17. 



OF OUR LOKD JESUS CHRIST. 171 

and made me equal, and compared me, and made me 
like ?"* " I have brought up children and exalted them, 
and they have despised me."f They had to choose 
between life and death, and they preferred death. 

O matchless iniquity ! the son of Belial is preferred 
to the son of God — the murderer to him who immolates 
himself to give us life ! Unhappy Jews, your request 
shall be granted ! No, the conquering Lamb shall not 
reign over you, for his yoke is too sweet and his burden 
too light ! Your brow, branded with the deicide, shall 
bear the mark of him whose children you declare your- 
selves ; you shall have for chief him whom Barabbas 
represents, and who " was a murderer from the begin- 
ning ;"$ the devil shall reign over you ; he shall keep you 
in blindness till the end of ages even as he does at this 
moment when you disown the Messiah, to whom you 
prefer a wretch, a ruffian ! 

No ! Christ will not rule over you, fallen priests of the 
priesthood of Aaron, sacrilegious profaners of the holy 
unction ! you have led into error those whom you were 
commissioned to enlighten ; you have ruined them and 
ruined yourselves : hence your sacrifices and your 
worship shall cease, your temple shall be destroyed, and 
henceforth, you shall be only ministers of error. 

But let us not confine ourselves, O christian souls ! 
with exciting in our hearts those sentiments of just 
indignation ; let us ask ourselves why Barabbas is thus 
preferred to Jesus. 

This choice is caused not only by the perversity 
of the Jews, the envy of the chief priests, the pride of 

* Isa., xlvi. 5. t Ihid., i. 2. - '} St. John, viii. 44. 



172 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

the devil, but still more by our sins : yes, it is our sins 
that weighed down the balance on the side of Barabbas, 
it was our sins that made the most contemptible of men 
be preferred to Jesus. 

This Barabbas, this condemned criminal, who can 
only be liberated on condition that you are condemned, 
divine Savior ! — does he not also represent mankind 
become, alas ! so criminal after the first sin, and who, 
condemned to death, have no hope of safety but in your 
immolation I On the side of Barabbas, there are then, 
in reality, all men, and on the other, you alone, O 
Jesus ! and when Pilate says, " Whom shall I deliver V J 
thy Father addresses to thee the same question ; and 
thou, O charitable Redeemer, saving Victim, thou 
answerest : " Not me but Barabbas ; not mc, but men ! 
Yes, let men be delivered, and let me be crucified for 
them ! " 

Lord ! is it thus that a mystery of mercy is 
veiled under a mystery of iniquity ? that that which is 
an act of the most crying injustice on the part of thine 
enemies, is on thy part the work of thine infinite 
charity and unbounded generosity ? 

APPLICATION. 

What, then, should be our sentiments of gratitude 
towards our generous Redeemer, who made himself 
accursed for us ! Yes ! to deliver us from death to 
which we were condemned, he gave himself up thereto : 
he preferred us to himself, us wretched criminals. O 
prodigy of devotion ! O incomprehensible charity ! 
T> i the parallel which his mercy established between 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 173 

him and us, it is we who have the advantage over 
him ! 

Let us be persuaded, from the example of the Jews, 
that the passions lead to error, warp the judgment ; 
that under their influence, we prefer evil to good, error 
to truth, vice to virtue, Barabbas to Jesus ! 

We are justly indignant at the conduct of Pilate, who 
dares to put Jesus" on a par with Barabbas ; we 
anathematize the unjust choice made by the Jews ; but 
have we not reason to turn our indignation against our- 
selves ! How many times have we not given the devil 
the preference over Jesus ? What else do we do, each 
time that we commit sin ? Do we not then say : 
" Take Jesus from before my eyes ; I will not have 
him for king ; I prefer the devil and the world to 
him?" 

Pilate knew not Jesus Christ — the Jewish people 
were influenced by the chief priests : but we Christians, 
we religious, we have not these miserable excuses ; for 
we know that Jesus is our Grod, that the world and the 
devil are his enemies and ours. Ah ! how, then, can 
we sufficiently deplore having preferred the latter to 
him, having put in one scale of the balance our own 
gratification, and in the other his adorable will, and 
alas ! so often sacrificed the latter to the former ? . . . 

PRAYER. 

It is to me, Lord, that thou addressest that 
reproach, " To whom have you likened me ? " Alas ! 
I have very often instituted a parallel between thee, on 
tho one side, my sovereign Master ! and on the 



174 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

other, the creature and my own satisfaction. A 
thousand times have I hesitated betweeen the false 
pleasure which is found in sin, and the true sweetness 
that is found in thy service ; between the gratification 
of the senses, and the accomplishment of thy holy laws 

between what the world and the devil inspired, and 

what my conscience dictated. 

I have hesitated ; and then— Ah ! T dare not con- 
fess it, Lord ! I have preferred my OAvn gratification, 
the world, the devil, to thee who art my God, my life, 
my hope, and who can alone be my felicity. 

Oh ! pardon, Lord, pardon, for such crying injustice ! 
I confess and deplore it. Deign, I beseech thee, to 
enlighten me with thy light, and to excite me by thy 
grace, to the end that, guiding myself always by thy 
spirit of wisdom, I may never hesitate between good 
and evil, but dispose myself constantly and coura- 
geously to the accomplishment of thy holy will. 

(See Resumes, page 396.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 175 

THIRTIETH MEDITATION. 
THE SCOURGING. 



Pilate took Jesus and scourged him.'' — St. John, xix. 1. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Pilate seeing that the Jews had preferred the 
deliverance of Barabbas to that of Jesus, and wishing 
to dissuade them from their unjust design which, never- 
theless, he dared not directly oppose, devised a new 
expedient which appeared likely to satisfy their hatred, 
or at least to excite their pity : " I wiU chastise him, 
therefore, and let him go ! "* — that is to say, although 
I am compelled to acknowlege him innocent, I will, 
nevertheless, scourge him ; then I wiU present him to 
you all bloody, covered with wounds, and, doubtless, 
you will no longer oppose my letting him go. 

O barbarous and unjust compassion ! what grief and 
confusion thou art going to bring to the divine Lamb 
whom thou pretendest to save ! guilty and shameful 
weakness ! What ! thou knowest, Pilate, that Jesus 
is innocent, and thou causest him to be scourged? Is 
this, then, an expedient worthy of a Roman prsetor, in 
presence of a seditious crowd who would fain wrest from 
thee an unjust sentence ? 

* St. Luke, xxiii. 22. 



176 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

Meanwhile the order is given: Roman soldiers are 
charged with executing it; and they are about to do so 
with unheard-of cruelty. A Jewish court could not 
have given him more than forty blows ; but the Roman 
laws restrict not the number : all power is, therefore, 
given to the executioners. Furthermore, the motive 
from which Jesus is scourged tends to make them 
pitiless, since the object is to reduce that adorable Victim 
to a state capable of softening the barbarous hearts of 
his enemies ! 

Ah ! let us transport ourselves in spirit into the court 
of the pretorium: let us behold our amiable Savior, 
worn out with fatigue and scarcely able to sustain him- 
self, walking between two hues of soldiers, and becom- 
ing more and more an object of contempt and derision 
to the people and the chiefs of the synagogue ! He 
arrives at the place of torment, he strips himself of his 
garments ; he then draws near to the pillar to which he 
is to be bound; he bows his head under the weight of 
shame, and holds out his hands to the ignominious cords 
of the executioners. 

Great God ! what a spectacle ! how the Christian 
heart is oppressed at the contemplation of such a 
picture ! it is Jesus, it is the Holy of Holies who is 
thus humiliated, reduced to the condition of a miser- 
able slave who is about to receive punishment! O 
heavens, how could you shed your light on such a 
crime ! 

But behold! the executioners are preparing to execute 
the cruel sentence. Some are armed with flexible rods, 
others with knotted cords, others again with leathern 



OF OUR LOED JESUS CHRIST. 177 

thongs tipped with iron : they all approach Jesus and 
begin to strike him. 

Christians, Disciples of that Divine Savior ! 
lend an ear, and, amid the cries and cruel acclamations 
of the Jews, hear the redoubled blows resound. The 
rods, the whips furrow in every sense the sacred body 
of the victim ; soon it displays horrible bruises, and 
becomes all swollen with contusions. Beneath the con- 
tinous strokes the skin is torn — livid blood spouts 
from the wounds — the flesh is exposed — and from head to 
foot the divine body is covered with wounds. . . 

Nevertheless, the executioners do not stop ; they 
make new wounds on those already formed ; the sinews 
are rent asunder, the veins broken, the flesh torn, the 
bones uncovered ! 

The blood of the Adorable Victim is shed profusely : 
the pillar is stained with it, and the floor overflowed ; 
the executioners shamefully trample on it ! 

O what heart would not be moved with the liveliest 
compassion ! what eyes would not shed tears at the 
contemplation of such woes ! To what sufferings, O 
Lord, has thou subjected thine immaculate body ! 

Shame and confusion overspread the face of the 
Adorable Victim who undergoes all tortures, all the 
flames of sorrow ! 

And thus was accomplished what was spoken by the 
prophet-king : " My enemies are grown strong, who 
wrongfully persecuted me ; I have borne reproach, 
shame hath covered my face. There is no sound spot 
in my flesh. I am afflicted and humbled exceedingly. 
My heart is troubled ; my strength hath left me. The 



178 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

wicked have wrought upon my back : they have length- 
ened their iniquity."* 

At this moment are also fulfilled the words of Isaiah : 
There is no beauty in him, nor comeliness ; " We have 
seen him : and there was no sightliness that we should 
be desirous of him ; despised, and the most abject of 
men, a man of sorrows, who is acquainted with infirmity ; 
we esteemed him not, we have thought him as it were 
a leper, and as one struck by God ; but he was wounded 
for our iniquities, and by his bruises we are healed. From 
the top of his head to the sole of his foot there is no 
soundness in him ; he is covered with bruises and 
wounds, "t 

APPLICATION. 

This spectacle softens, penetrates you, < Ihristian si nils ! 
and you would be very hard and much to be pitied if 
you were insensible to it. But that does not suffice : you 
must excite in yourselves the. most lively contrition for 
your faults, you must rend your hearts with sorrow tor 
having sinned. 

Alas ! yes, the scourging of Jesus is less the act of 
Pilate who decrees it, of the executioners who execute it, 
than of you, miserable sinners, who are its true cause ; 
this atrocious punishment is what we have deserved ; 
it was for our iniquity that Christ was bruised in 
infirmity, f 

It was to expiate our sensuality and daintiness that 
he was, so to say, flayed alive. The spotless Lamb, 

* Ps., xxxvii. ; lxviii. ; cxxviii. 
t Isa., Hii. t Ibid. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 179 

the holy Victim, gave up his innocent flesh to blows 
and bruises in order to expiate for our guilty flesh, and 
to merit for us the grace to subject it to our spirit, and 
to chastise it by mortification, when as a refractory slave, 
it rebels against us. 

Let us enter into the spirit of this mystery : let us 
detest sin, by all the compassion which we feel for 
Jesus scourged. Let us be truly grateful to this divine 
Savior for the ineffable goodness which induced him to 
substitute himself for us, to undergo the punishment that 
we have deserved, and of which the devils in hell should 
be the executors. Let us be inspired with a salutary 
hatred of our bodies : in imitation of all the holy peni- 
tents, let us scourge by mortification that sinful flesh 
which draws us to evil, and let us subject it to the spirit. 

Let us arm ourselves with patience in afflictions, 
trials, sickness : ah ! what are our sorrows, compared 
with the sorrows of our Beloved ? What ! Should we 
dare to complain of some privation, after consider- 
ing him in the state wherein he has shown himself to 
us? 

No ! no ! that cannot be, especially for us, religious, 
who acknowledge him as our head, and our model, and 
who profess to bear the marks of mortification of which 
he has given us the example, and the merits of which 
he applies to us. 

PRAYER. 

Holy God, spotless Lamb, O beloved of my soul ! I 
cannot express what I feel at the bloody spectacle of 
thy scourging — thine innocent flesh ruthlessly torn, thy 



180 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

veins open, thy blood shed, thy body covered with 
wounds — all penetrate my very heart, and call forth my 
tears. 

Behold these tears, O my Jesus ! they are tears of 
compassion, for I suffer with thee ; but, my Savior, 
they are also tears of regret : when I think it was cruel I 
who struck thee, who gave thee wound on wound, I feel 
my heart broken with sorrow, I am ashamed of myself, 
I know not where to hide, to conceal myself from my 
own eyes. 

O Jesus ! by the pains of thy scourging, forgive me ; 
purify me in the saving bath of thy blood, and grant 
me to be generous in thy service, to dread no pains, 
privations, sufferings ! What is all that to what thou 
hast endured for us ! 

And thou, O Mary, chaste mother of pure love ! deliver 
my soul from every stain ; ask that grace of Jesus through 
the merits of his cruel scourging, and obtain for me to 
be a mortified religious, and a worthy imitator of thy 
divine Son. 

(See Resumes, page 396.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 181 

THIRTY-FIRST MEDITATION. 
JESUS IS CROWNED WITH THORNS. 



And stripping him, they put a scarlet cloak abcmt him ; and, 
plaiting a crown of thorns, they put it upon his head." — 
St. Matt., xxvii. 28, 29. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us contemplate our divine Savior exhausted by 
the long and cruel scourging he has undergone ! He is 
covered from head to foot with bleeding wounds and 
livid bruises, and unable to sustain himself by reason of 
the quantity of blood he has shed ! The executioners, 
tired of striking him, at length unbind him ; and when 
once he is no longer fastened by cords to the pillar, he 
falls to the ground, where, doubtless, he would have 
died if his divinity had not come to the aid of his 
humanity, so as to give him new strength and allow 
him to go on in his career of suffering, even to the end. 

O sad and grievous spectacle, fit to soften a rock ! 
incomprehensible situation of an all-powerful God, sink- 
ing under the blows of men, his creatures, stretched on 
the ground which he has reddened with his blood, 
reduced to be a cause of barbarous pleasure to his 
enemies ! 

lie at length raises himself, with a thousand pains ; 
tottering, he picks up his scattered garments. ... he 



182 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

puts them on . . . Alas ! they are the only dressing 
that will be applied to his wounds ! and now, O Pilate ! 
you may present him to the Jews. If their hatred can 
be satisfied short of the death of Jesus, it will be now; 
for nothing:, save death alone, can be conceived to add 
to such horrible torments. 

Yes, human imagination could go no further ; but 
the devil is more fruitful than man in barbarous inven- 
tions ; now it is he who inspires the enemies of Jesus : 
they will, therefore, find means to add still more to the 
sufferings of the adorable Victim, and to follow up the 
scourging by another torture no less cruel. 

The emissaries of the chief priests, in fact, remind 
the people and the soldiers, that Jesus had styled him- 
self king, and that Pilate never mentioned him without 
giving him the title of " King of the Jews." They pro- 
pose to make game of him, by making him a mock king, 
to ridicule his dignity in the most outrageous manner. 

The soldiers again lay hold of Jesus, still i ' dumb as 
a lamb before his shearer;"* they treat him with the 
utmost barbarity : they seat him on the broken shaft of 
a pillar for his throne, throw over his shoulders, as 
a royal mantle, an old purple rag, then they place in 
liis right hand a reed for a sceptre, and begin to make 
show of paying him homage as courtiers are wont to do 
to their sovereign. 

Then, as the height of insult, and also to aggravate 
his sufferings, a soldier approaches him, holding in his 
hands a crown of thorns, and places it on his head, 
amid shouts of laughter from all the spectators ! 
* Isa., liii. 7. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 183 

Then begin again the mock salutes, the ironical 
homage : the soldiers gather around Jesus, and, pass- 
ing in succession before him, each one bends the knee, 
saying in derision, " Hail, King of the Jews ! " * All 
with one accord treat him, then, with the greatest 
indignity, such as was never offered to the vilest of 
Avretches ; some disfigure his face with savage blows, 
others pluck his hair and beard ; these spit in his 
face, those strike him with their fists ; others, again, 
taking the reed from his hand, make use of it to drive 
the crown of thorns farther into his head, and by those 
fearful blows renew all his pains. 

What a sight ! and what sentiments it ought to 
excite in our souls ! 

Yes! it is our divine Savior whom we contemplate 
seated on a stone, all covered with wounds, streaming- 
blood, a purple rag on his shoulders, an ignominious 
reed in his hand, wearing on his adorable head the 
diadem wherewith the synagogue has crowned him,f 
his brow pierced with thorns, his face covered with 
filthy spittle, and especially with the blood which, flow- 
ing from his wounds, trickles down over his dishevelled 
hair, reddens his eyebrows, mingles with his tears and 
furrows his cheeks ! . . . Scarcely would his divine 
Mother recognize him in this state ! 

And you, Christian souls ! do you recognize him, at this 
moment when he is draining the last drop, the chalice 
of grief and that of contempt, a thousand times more 
bitter ? 

And yet, it is truly the adorable Son of the Father, 
* St. Matt., xxvii. 29. t Cant., iii. 11. 



184 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

the image of his splendor, the sole object of his eternal 
delight, God like him ! Yes, it is Jesus, our beloved 
.Savior, who is treated thus, who suffers so much 
opprobrium for our sake ! 

Let us, then, fix our eyes on him, and understand 
the value he sets on us. It is for us, it is to restore to 
us the crown of glory we had lost, that he has deigned 
to wear the crown of thorns ; it is to prevent Satan 
from ruling us with a sceptre of iron that he has taken 
the mock sceptre of a reed. Yes ! the insults heaped 
upon him, the ignominy with which he is overwhelmed, 
were justly due to us, because of our crimes ; and we 
should have felt them for all eternity, if he, in his 
infinite charity, had not taken upon him to undergo 
them in our place 

APPLICATION. 

Christian souls ! what sentiments should be ours while 
contemplating the mystery of the crowning with thorns ! 
how we should hate sin ! with what care we should 
avoid it ! Let us reflect that, to offend God, is to take 
the reed which Jesus held in his hand, and strike with 
it the crown of anguish we have already placed on his 
head by our past faults ! . . . 

Let us not only avoid sin, but work resolutely to 
acquire the virtues of which Jesus gives us the 
example. 

Let us imitate his patience : we have seen him 
endure torments the very thought of which makes us 
shudder ;, well ! he endured them without a murmur ; 
he remained calm, and quiet on the ignominious throne 






OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 185 

on which he was seated, as if he delighted in his 
sufferings. 

Let us imitate his humility ; with what ardor, what 
zeal, should Ave not embrace the practice of that virtue ! 
In the scourging, Jesus principally expiated our sensu- 
ality ; in the crowning with thorns, he specially 
expiated our sins of pride, our ambitious thoughts, our 
vanity, our desire to wear under one form or another 
the crown of the esteem of men. Ah ! could we again 
aspire to be honored, after having considered our 
Master, our model, a prey to the most shameful outrages, 
and the object of the greatest contempt ? 

Let us beware of imitating the Jews, who did not 
recognize their king under the insignia wherewith they 
had invested him. 

Beneath that crown of thorns, beneath that bloody 
mantle, let us adore Jesus, the king of our hearts, and 
let us be submissive to all his commands. He had said, 
some moments before : " My kingdom is not of this 
world." Now, he shows it at this very moment when 
he appears as the most miserable of men. The king of 
glory in eternity, it is his will to be only in time the 
king of sorrow. 

PRAYER. 

O King of glory ! crowned with thorns, I adore thee 
in the state of suffering and humiliation to which thou 
hast been reduced through love for me ; I bless thee 
for thy infinite generosity, which led thee to accept so 
much degradation in order to raise me up to thee. 

The spectacle of thy sufferings excites my gratitude 



ISO MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

and my love; but how much does it not also afflict 
me ! . . . When I think that it is I who am its true 
cause, that it is I who have placed on thy brow the 
crown of thorns, I who have struck thee in the face, 
who have outraged thee, mocking thy royalty, — my 
heart is broken with sorrow, shame covers my brow 
and I can only say: " Pardon, O Jesus, pardon, be 
merciful unto me ; I ask it of thee even by the sorrows 
which I have caused thee." 

O Mary ! pray for us, poor sinners, now that we ask 
pardon of thy Son; and obtain for us that we may 
procure him as much glory as we have, by our offences, 
drawn contempt and humiliation upon him ! 

(See Resumes, page 397.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 187 

, THIRTY-SECOND MEDITATION. 
JESUS IS SHOWN TO THE PEOPLE. 



Behold the man ! " — St. John, xix. 5. 



CONSIDERATION. 

The passion of our Lord Jesus Christ is but a flow 
and ebb of pains and humiliations, of torture and 
ignominy 7 which, in uninterrupted succession, over- 
whelm his adorable body and break his divine heart ! 
Thus it was that, after the bloody scourging, the cruel 
crowning with thorns took place, and after the crowning, 
the shameful exposure of the victim to the eyes of an 
insolent and inhuman populace. 

Pilate, seeing Jesus all covered with blood and livid 
wounds, judges that he may present him to the Jews, 
persuaded that, considering him in that state, they will 
feel some sentiment of pity for him and ask for his 
liberation. It appears to him that the expedient, sug- 
gested by his weakness and his cruel compassion, must 
succeed. He thinks that it is to the people he is going 
to present Jesus ; that uninfluenced by envy or hatred, 
the crowd ought to have at heart only affection and 
gratitude for a man who has only done them good ; that 
these sentiments of justice await but the opportunity 
which he is going to give them, in order to manifest 
themselves. 



188 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

Moreover, he remembers that a few days before they 
received Jesus in triumph when he entered Jerusalem, 
and he hoped that, touched with compassion, they would 
ask him to set him free. 

Thus, counting- on the pity and gratitude of the Jews, 
Pilate orders the victim of his criminal weakness and 
of the hatred of the chief priests, to be taken to a 
balcony whence he could be seen by the multitude that 
fills the street and besieges the palace. 

Jesus arrives there j all eyes are fixed upon him ; 
ah ! doubtless, all will shed tears : for what man could 
contemplate such a spectacle without feeling the live- 
liest emotion ? 

Behold, O people ! the Nazarene whose beauty and 
grace you admired : he is now in the state in which 
the prophets saw him, without beauty or comeliness.* He 
appears as a man annihilated, his face is concealed by a 
veil of blood, of filth, of spittle ; his hair hangs di- 
shevelled in tangled locks, on his bruised shoulders. 
Shame and confusion are stamped on his brow ; all his 
features are changed, his countenance expresses only 
the soitoav, the anguish of a breaking heart; on his breast 
are seen wounds large and deep ; his whole body 
appears but one wound — he is like those lepers in whom 
no sound spot can be found. His august head is sur- 
mounted by a crown of long sharp thorns which pierce 
to the bone ! 

Consider, O Israel ! to what a state the new Samson 
has been reduced by the cruel Philistines to whom he 
was delivered by the synagogue ! see with what contempt 
* Isa.. liii. 2. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 189 

he is overwhelmed. Behold that diadem the sight of 
which makes us shudder, that purple rag wherewith he 
is covered to hide his nakedness, that reed which he 
holds in his right hand : these are the insignia of his 
royalty. 

Listen to the mockery made of him ; mark the 
barbarous insults heaped upon him. Ah ! could human 
imagination picture to itself so many humiliations 
added to so many sorrows ? . . . 

And he who is thus placed before thine eyes, know- 
est thou who he is ? Do you see in him thy friend, thy 
protector, thy Father, the Messiah expected for four 
thousand years 1 

No ! the multitude of the Jews do not recognize him 
even as a man ! all eyes are fixed on Jesus ; but none 
are moist with the tear of pity, and the people cry with 
one accord : " Away with him, away with him ; crucify 
him!"* 

Pilate, who sees the disposition of the Jews, cannot 
believe in so much barbarity ; he goes forward on the 
balcony, and wishing to bring back the crowd to human 
sentiments, he speaks in a loud voice those words of 
such deep meaning, "Behold the man ! " that is to say : — 
Behold him whom you have delivered unto me, behold 
the state in which he is. If, in styling himself king, he 
has excited your envy, his present debasement should 
awaken your pity ; you can hate him no more, since 
his sufferings and ignominy have reached their height. 

But let us leave that unhappy people, influenced 
by the princes of the synagogue, to answer again with 
I St. John, xix. 15. 



190 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

renewed rage : " Away with him ! away with him ; 
crucify him ! " Let us turn our mind from a subject so 
painful, and reflect on the different meaning of those 
mystic words, "Behold the man!" which Pilate utters, 
without comprehending the sublime truths they express. 

"Behold the man''" who mysteriously represents fallen 
humanity; "Behold the man" who expiates for all 
sinners, the man who sacrifices himself to restore us, to 
re-establish us in our former privileges. This is the 
Man-God in the state to which his love for us has 
reduced him. 

" Behold the model man," the man to whom the elect 
must be conformable ; it is " the new man," with whom 
Christians must clothe themselves and whose livery they 
must wear, in order to obtain mercy and to arrive one 
day at glory. 

" Behold the man " whom we must recognize, adore, 
and glorify as God. 

" Behold the man," says Pilate, and for more than 
eighteen centuries faith replies : " Behold the God who 
has saved mankind." " Behold the man," say the 
indifferent and the impious, speaking of Jesus ; and the 
Church replies : " Behold the Man-God who, as he him- 
self declared to Caiaphas, shall one day come in the 
clouds of heaven to judge the living and the dead, and 
to make himself known to all as the only true God." 

APPLICATION. 

And now, let us imagine, Christian souls ! that God 
the Father, showing us his divine Son in the state to 
which he has reduced himself for our sake, tells us': — 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 191 

u 'Behold the man' in whom I am well pleased, and 
whom you must try to resemble if you would please me. 
' Behold the man ' who was bruised in his infirmity 
because of your sins. See ! his garments are red as 
those of him who treads the wine-press ; but they are 
red with his own blood which he freely sheds for your 
salvation, and to expiate your ceaseless infidelity. In 
reality, it is your pride which has crowned him with 
thorns, your ambition which has placed in his hand 
that mock sceptre, your sensuality which has covered 
him with wounds, your human respect which causes 
the shame that overwhelms him." 

Christians, and especially we religious, let us hear 
that voice of God the Father ! let us see in Jesus our 
victim and our model, let us detest sin and take every 
means of avoiding it ; let us make ourselves like unto 
the new man now shown to the world. 

" Behold the man," to whose image we are to form 
ourselves. Courage, then ! let us put on his livery, 
revolting as it appears to nature ; let us encircle our 
brow with his dolorous crown, accepting, with resig- 
nation, contempt and rebuke ; let us cast his bloody 
mantle on our shoulders, generously embracing the 
practices of mortification belonging to our state ; let us 
take the reed-sceptre in our hands, humbly acknow- 
ledging that, of ourselves, we arc nought but weakness 
and inconstancy. 

Happy if, at the hour of death, we may thus present 
ourselves before that "Man" who is the Supreme Judge 
of all men ! He will know us by his own livery, and 
will make us participators in his celestial royalty. 



192 MEDITATIONS OX THE PASSION 

PRAYER. 

Accept my homage, O Jesus, my sovereign King, 
my Lord and my God ! In vain would the wicked take 
from thee thy glory ; in vain do they present thee as 
having only a reed for sceptre, and a crown of thorns : 
thou shalt remain supreme Master of heaven and earth, 
the ruler in time and in eternity. 

my King ! who art also my model, I beseech 
thee, in the name of the pains thou didst endure in thy 
Passion, to give me courage to make myself like unto 
thee, by the practice of humility and mortification, so 
that, at the day of my death, I may say with confidence 
to thy Father those words which we daily repeat : "I 
beseech thee, my God ! to recognize me by the livery 
of my Lord Jesus," and to make me a participator in 
his glory. 

(See Resumes, page 397.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 193 



THIRTY-THIRD MEDITATION 

THE JEWS CONTINUE TO DEMAND THE 
DEATH OF JESUS. 



They cried out the more saying: 'Let him be crucified.'" 
—St. Matt., xxvii. 23. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us consider with a holy horror the cruelty, the 
blindness, and the malice of the enemies of Jesus, and 
learn from their example how dangerous it is to aUow 
ourselves to be swayed by pride and envy. 

Pilate had thought that by showing Jesus to the 
people covered with wounds, and, as one might say, 
bathed in his blood, he would excite pity in every 
heart ; but he soon found himself mistaken ; for, the 
moment he presents him to them, saying, " Behold the 
man," the chiefs of the nation cry out : " Crucify him ! 
crucify him ! " 

Thus, the cruel expedient of the weak governor is of 
no avail ; it has had no effect on those erring souls. Ah ! 
it is that passions are never appeased by a first gratifi- 
cation ; it is that envy makes the heart insensible 
to misfortune, and closes it to pity; it is that man, 
abandoned to himself, stops not midway in evil, but 
goes down to its very depths. 

No, the hatred of the Jews is not satisfied by the 




194 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

scourging, the crowning with thorns, the grievous 
insults that have been offered to our divine Savior ; it 
will have him die the death of the cross : " Crucify 
him ! crucify him," shouts the multitude, excited by 
the chief priests. 

Pilate, thwarted once more in his attempt, says 
testily to the Jews : " Take him you, and crucify him ; 
for I find no cause in him."* He thus declares Jesus 
innocent of the crimes whereof they had accused him, 
and for which they had delivered him into his hands. 
But what avails that new declaration of the innocence 
of Jesus with people who seek his destruction, and who 
have already obtained so much from the weakness of 
the judge who publicly acknowledges it ? 

Kepeating again the pretended delinquency of the 
Savior on the score of religion, they invoke against 
him the law of Moses : " We have a law," say they to 
Pilate ; " and according to that law he ought to die, 
because he made himself the Son of God."t O hypo- 
crites ! who appear zealous for the law, whereas in 
violation of the law, they conspire the death of the 
Just! ... 

Yes, O chief priests and ancients of the people ! you 
have a law, but it is for you a dead letter, a sealed 
book : you no longer understand it. You recall it to 
condemn Jesus " who made himself the Son of God ; " 
but does it not give testimony of him ! Do you not 
read in it that the Messiah was to come with all the 
marks under which Jesus appears before you ? 

You have a law, you say ; ah ! you do not appeal to 
* St. John, xix. 6. f Ibid., 7. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 195 

Sacrilegious profaners ! you make 
use of it only as a means of attaining your criminal 
ends. 

The Jews had hoped that Pilate, little acquainted 
with their law, would give way to their testimony, and 
condemn Jesus for announcing himself as the Son of 
God ; but that word, wljich, in their fury, escaped from 
them, well-nigh snatched their Victim from them. 

Pilate, as soon as he heard their new accusation, 
feels more fearful than before ; he perceives the 
divinity in the accused, so different from all others, who 
has manifested so much wisdom in the few words he 
has spoken, who has shown himself so strong in afflic- 
tion, and whose look has ever been so mild, even to his 
enemies. He has him brought in again, and asks 
him whence he is ? But as Jesus makes no answer, the 
governor says to him, impatiently and threateningly : 
" Speakest thou not to me ? knowest thou not that I 
have power to crucify thee, and I have power to release 
thee ? "* 

Thus Pilate speaks of the power vested in him, and 
which, nevertheless, by a guilty cowardice, he does 
not dare to use on behalf of him whom he has found 
and declared innocent. 

But Jesus Christ, wishing to give him a new lesson, 
reminds him, gently yet firmly, of the origin of that 
power : " Thou shouldst not have any power against 
me, unless it were given thee from above. Therefore, 
he that hath delivered me to thee hath the greater 
sin."t 

* St. John, xix. 10. t Ibid-, xi. 



196 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

Oh ! what precious teachings the divine Master gives 
to men by this answer. 

The power of acting against him comes from above : 
it is, then, himself, the most high God, who deigned to 
give men power over him ; his immolation is, therefore, 
on his part, a free act, inspired by his love for us and 
by his infinite generosity. 

In reminding Pilate of the origin of his power, Jesus 
teaches all that authority and power to act are only given 
to men to use according to justice, and never to serve 
the passions ; and in telling him that he is less guilty 
than those who delivered him up to him, he also lays 
down that grand principle, that they who have more 
light in regard to good, are more criminal in doing evil. 

Pilate understands, to a certain extent, these sublime 
teachings, and would fain set Jesus free ; but, alas ! his 
heart was far from being accessible to the love of truth 
and justice. He fears, moreover, to displease men, and 
from that it is that the Jews are about to drag him into 
granting them what they ask : "If thou release this 
man," say they, "thou art not Caesar's friend; for 
whosoever maketh himself a king, speaketh against 
Caesar."* 

These threats make the deepest impression on the 
heart of the weak governor. Yet he makes another 
attempt. Seating himself on his judgment seat, he 
presents Jesus to the people, and speaks those mystic 
words, " Behold your King." — " Away with him, crucify 
him,"t cry out the Jews, who will not acknowledge 
Jesus for their king. 

* St. John, xix. 12. \ Hid., 14, 15. 



OP OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 197 

But Pilate again proclaims his royalty. " What ! " says 
he, "shall I crucify your king?" — "We have no king 
but Caesar/'* the chief priests reply. 

O blindness ! O injustice ! no less cruel to themselves 
than to Jesus! no, they will not have for king that 
Lamb whose authority they refuse to acknowledge ; 
but they shall be ruled, with a rod of iron, then crushed 
by the very power to which they declare themselves 
subject. 

APPLICATION. 

What precious fruits may we draw from this medita- 
tion ! And first, let us understand tnat our passions can 
never be satisfied ; that if they are not resisted, they 
draw us into the abyss of evil, incite us to say to Jesus, 
in the depth of our heart, those words of the Jews before 
Pilate, " Away with him ! crucify him ! '*' and separate us 
from him who is alone the author of all good, and away 
from whom man can expect only infinite misfortune. 

Ah ! let us not imitate that cowardly governor who, 
obedient to human motives, dares not oppose the 
enemies of Jesus ; let us impose silence on our pas- 
sions : all can do ifcjby the grace of God. 

All of us, too, inasmuch as we are free, have re- 
ceived from above power to act : let us often think 
that Ave should only use it according to equity ; that is 
to say, that we should only decide after the prescrip- 
tions of the divine law, and not after our unruly 
passions. 

Let us act only from motives of faith ; let us never 
* St. John. xix. 15. 



198 * MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

obey our vicious inclinations : — we religious ought 
especially to do so — we who have received so much 
light concerning good. Oh ! how guilty we should be 
if sin still dwelt in our hearts ! 

Let us pay homage to our divine Savior, who, to 
save us, gave power to men against himself. Let us 
love him, let us thank him for his infinite generosity, 
and give him, in return, and by an increased conse- 
cration, all power over our heart. 

PRAYER. 

O Jesus ! supreme King ! accept the offering I make 
thee of my heart and of all that is mine. 

Yes, I belong to thee, O my beloved Master ! and 
my sole desire is to testify it to thee by a courageous 
struggle against my passions, and by the most constant 
fidelity to thy holy law. 

Oh ! give me strength to carry out the resolution 
which I form, at this moment, of being all thine, and of 
showing thee by all my actions, that I really acknow- 
ledge thee for my Lord, my king, my God ! 

(See Resumes, page 398. ) 



OF OUE LORD JESUS CHRIST. 199 

THIRTY-FOURTH MEDITATION. 
JESUS IS CONDEMNED TO DEATH. 



"Jesus he delivered up to their will." — St. Luke, xxiii. 25. 



CONSIDERATION. 

It is in vain that Pilate, wishing to save Jesus from the 
cruelty of the Jews, has proclaimed his innocence, has 
caused him to be crueUy scourged, presented him to 
them in the most deplorable state, and appealed to the 
generous feelings of the people : aU these means, 
suggested by his criminal weakness, have been in- 
effectual. The same death-cries are still heard. 

The seditious demand is enforced by the threat of a 
denunciation at the court* of Csesar ; Pilate is overcome, 
he is about to yield to the pressure which the chief 
priests and ancients of the people have brought to bear 
upon him. 

He is going to yield ! . . . And yet what motives he 
has for resisting still, aye, even unto death ! As a 
Roman Governor, should he quail before sedition "? As 
a Judge, can he resolve to sign an unjust warrant, to 
declare deserving of death him whom he has declared 
innocent ? Moreover, has he not received several 
warnings from heaven ? Has not his wife sent to tell 
him to "have nothing to do with that just man?"* 
* St. Matt... xxvii. 10. 



200 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

And has not he himself perceived the Divinity in that 
Accused, so extraordinary and so different from others ! 

But these motives, all-potent as they ought to be, 
vanish before the fear of falling into disgrace with 
Tiberius — the cowardly governor accedes to what is 
demanded of him. 

Nevertheless he wishes to manifest by a ceremony 
in use amongst the Jews, that he throws upon them- 
selves the responsibility of the judgment they force 
from him : he causes water to be brought in a basin, 
and washing his hands before the people, he says : u I am 
innocent of the blood of this just man ; look you to 
it."* 

But the Jews, regardless of this warning and declara- 
tion, make answer that they assume the whole respon- 
sibility of the condemnation they demand. Let us 
hear them utter that imprecation which stands alone in 
the annals of nations, as it is unequalled in the rigor of 
its fulfilment : " His blood be upon us, and upon our 
children !"t 

Unhappy people ! what words have you uttered I 
What ! a pagan trembles when about to condemn a just 
man ! and you, adorers of the true God, you shrink not 
from calling down on your own heads the divine ven- 
geance merited by that condemnation ! Ah ! you think 
not that the blood about to be shed is that of a God, 
and that he who will avenge it, and whose wrath you 
provoke, is the Master of time — he who disposes of the 
nations of the earth at his will, and who has all eternity 
to exercise his justice ! 

* St. Matt., x.wii. 24. t Ibid., 25. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 201 

O people ! fear you not having the fate of Cain, who, 
through envy, arose against his brother Abel, and killed 
him ? — the fate of Cain to whom God said: " What hast 
thou done ? The voice of thy brother's blood crieth to 
me ; cursed shalt thou be upon the earth ... a 
fugitive and a vagabond shalt thou be,' 7 * bearing on 
thy brow a sign whereby all may know thee. 

No ! the Jews foresee not the woes they are drawing 
down upon themselves. Oh ! how far they are from 
thinking that the utter ruin of their country shall follow 
the frightful words, " his blood be upon us, and upon 
our children ! " 

Jesus hears this imprecation, and his divine heart 
is overwhelmed with sorrow because of it : he sees 
numberless calamities coming upon all Judea and 
especially on Jerusalem. Ah ! doubtless, he weeps 
anew over that ungrateful city and her children who 
would not have the salvation he brought to them, choos- 
ing rather for their portion malediction and death. 

Pilate also has heard this imprecation, and it doubtless 
made him shudder with horror; but he takes advantage 
of it to excuse his weakness, and stifling the last cry 
of conscience, he at last orders the sentence to be 
written out which they demand. 

He afterwards pronounces it ; but, says St. Athanasius, 
he trembles while doing so, as if he himself were the 
accused and not the judge. 

"0 Pilate, O prevaricatingjudge!" says St. Cyprian, 
" a time shall come when thy soul shall fall into the 
hands of him whom thou condemnest : he shall judge 
* Gten., iv. 10-12, 14. 



202 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

thy judgment, and punish thee for the wrong thou hast 
done." ... 

The sentence is passed on Jesus . . . Ah ! what a 
spectacle, Christian souls, is now presented to our eyes ! 
The wicked have gained their end, and have caused the 
innocent to be condemned to a most infamous death : the 
angels veil their faces, seeing consummated the greatest 
iniquity that ever was ; pious persons, who had had 
some hope in the love of justice manifested by the gov- 
ernor, feel sad at heart and cruelly deceived ; hell 
prevails on earth ; the Just by excellence, the Holy One 
of God is treated as guilty ; the Author of life is judged 
worthy of death. . . 

And now, prostrate on the ground, let us behold 
Jesus standing as a criminal, hearing the supreme 
decree; let us behold the chief priests and the doctors 
of the law, exciting the people to applause the most 
humiliating to that divine Savior, felicitating them- 
selves on having gained their end, and desiring only the 
shedding of their Victim's blood on the tree of sorrow 
whereon he is to be fastened. 

APPLICATION. 

While contemplating Jesus sentenced to death, let us 
seek for the true cause of his condemnation. We shall 
not find it in the warrant signed by Pilate, for it 
expresses only a glorious title, that of u King of the 
Jews : " the cause is, then, elsewhere. 

Ah ! let us descend into our heart, it is there we shall 
find it ; for, alas ! it is our sins that have caused that 
sentence to be pronounced on our adorable Master, 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 203 

according to what is written in the prophecy of Isaiah : 
" The Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all . . . 
for the wickedness of my people have I struck him."* 

Let us, therefore, be less angry with Pilate and the 
Jews than with ourselves ; let us deplore their iniquity 
less than our own. Oh ! yes, let us bewail the misfort- 
une we have had in offending God, since it is the sole 
cause of the condemnation of our beloved Savior. 

Let us think that it is to deliver us from eternal 
death, that Jesus would be condemned to the ignomini- 
ous death of the cross. What ought, then, to be our 
sentiments of gratitude towards him ! From the 
warrant issued against us, miserable sinners, he erases 
our name and inscribes his own : " Jesus of Nazareth, 
the King of the Jews ! "t 

We have contemplated our divine Master, hearing 
with the greatest resignation the iniquitous sentence of 
the governor ! Well ! after his example, let us be 
patient and resigned when men condemn us and blame 
our conduct. It is often justly that we are rebuked, for, 
alas ! we all have our faults : oh ! then, let us bless 
God who wills that we be admonished, and let us labor to 
correct ourselves. If we are unjustly reprimanded, let 
us unite with Jesus who was condemned to the most 
infamous death, he the God thrice holy, — and, like him, 
let us pray for those who persecute and calumniate us. 

PRAYER. 

O Jesus, thou art condemned to death, and to the death 
of a malefactor ! thou, innocence itself and the source of 
* Isa., liii. 6, 8. t St. Luke, xix. 19. 



204 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

all sanctity. But why, then, is so iniquitous a sentence 
passed ? Whence comes it, Lord, that thou art judged 
unworthy to live even by him who proclaimed thine 
innocence 1 Ah ! it is that my sins whereAvith thou 
art charged, have called down on thy head the maledic- 
tion I have deserved ; it is that thou hast, by an excess 
of infinite generosity, subtituted thyself for me, to 
suffer the penalty of my crimes. In reality, it is 
therefore on my account that thou art condemned ; and 
so this sentence, the eternal dishonor of him who 
pronounced it, is my work. Oh ! what a subject of 
sorrow and regret for me ! 

Why can I not, < ) my Jesus ! deplore with tears of 
blood the misfortune I have had in offending God. and 
in thus necessitating my condemnation to the pains of 
hell, or thine to the torment of the cross ? Give me, I 
beseech thee ! with the grace of true contrition, that of 
the most lively gratitude to thee, to the end that I may 
unceasingly bless and thank thee for thy sacrifice which 
is my salvation. 

{See Resumes, page 1598.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 205 

THIRTY-FIFTH MEDITATION. 
JESUS IS LOADED WITH HIS CROSS. 



The government is upon his'" shoulder."— Isa., ix. 6. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Scarcely is the sentence of death pronounced, when 
the soldiers, charged with executing it, lay hold on 
Jesus : they take away the purple mantle wherewith 
they had clothed him in derision, to insult his royalty ; 
then they clothe him in his ordinary garments, in order 
that he may be more easily recognized between the two 
thieves who are also led to execution. As to him, still 
patient and silent, he aUows himself to be in turn stripped 
and clothed ; he utters no complaint, notwithstanding the 
pain and the confusion he feels. 

And now, Christians souls, let us consider our beloved 
Savior abandoned to his enemies, who are at liberty to 
do with him what they will ! Neither law, nor human 
power, any longer prescribes limits to their cruelty ; there 
is no longer a heart to pity him ; each one seems to say : 
"Let us treat him as an infamous man, let us hasten to 
make him disappear from off the earth — let him die ! " 

Yes ! chiefs of the synagogue, Jesus shall die, 
because the present moment is given to you ; but hope 
not that his name shall be forgotten and his memory 
perish. He who told you, " this is your hour," has not 



206 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

given you the future ; he has even declared that the 
time of his divine vengeance shall one day see him in 
the clouds of heaven, in the might of his power and 
clothed in the majesty of God. 

Meanwhile Jesus is brought out of the pretorium ; 
he is led to the cross on which he is to be immolated, 
and which he is condemned to carry to the summit of 
Calvary. 

Oh ! who can tell what he suffers at this moment ! 
Let us consider that he has taken neither rest nor food 
since he left the supper-room, that he has been for long 
hours a prey to all the inhumanity of a furious populace, 
that he shed a great quantity of blood in the Garden of 
Olives and during the scourging ; that he is bruised all 
over with cruel blows ; that he still wears the crown of 
thorns on his adorable head ; that, consequently, he 
must be reduced to the greatest weakness. He can 
hardly sustain himself, and yet he is obliged to load 
himself with the crushing weight of his cross ! 

Ah ! let us contemplate him in presence of that 
instrument of ignominy and death, placed before him by 
our sins. What repugnance ! what horror it excites in 
his soul ! 

Jesus, nevertheless, approaches with resignation the 
cross on which he is to be immolated ; he regards it 
calmly, and accepts it with perfect submission and even 
with joy, as being presented to him by his Father ! He 
takes it in his arms, and, touching it, he sanctifies it ; 
he kisses it as the altar of the divine Sacrifice he is going 
to offer for us ; he clasps it to his breast as though to 
express how much he desired it, and how much he esteems 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 207 

it ; he bends under that dolorous burden, and lays it on 
his bruised and mangled shoulders ! . . . 

And now, let us penetrate into his heart, Christian 
souls ! What are the feelings that crowd upon it ? On 
the one side, Jesus is seized with horror, and feels the 
greatest disgust at sight of the infamous wood whereon 
he is to die ; on the other, he is filled with love and joy, 
and seems to say — I see thee, I touch thee, I possess 
thee at last, O cross ! which I have so much desired, and 
which shall be the monument of my love for men — thou 
by whom they shall learn how much I love them, arid 
by what pains I have merited salvation for them ! . . . 

And amid all these sentiments, the prevailing ones are 
love, joy, and the desire of sacrificing himself for us ! 

But while contemplating Jesus loading himself with 
his cross, let us reflect on what that mysterious wood is, 
regarded with the eyes of faith. 

The Cross is the standard of the Supreme Monarch, 
which shall be planted in the sight of all men, and around 
which all nations shall come to range themselves ; it is 
the powerful ensign of the King of earth and heaven ; 
it is the sceptre by which he shall rule throughout the 
world, according to that saying of David, which the 
Church so solemnly sings : u By the wood the Lord hath 
reigned."* 

The cross is the altar of the holocaust whereon the 
saving host shall be consumed ; it is the wood which 
the God of Abraham has laid on the shoulders of the 
new Isaac, conducting him to the mountain of sacrifice ; 
it is the precious candlestick whereon shall be exposed 
* Hynin. Yc.villa Regis. 



208 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

he who is the light of nations ; it is the tree that shall 
bear the fruit of life, and by which shall be repaired 
the transgression of Adam and Eve in eating the fruit 
of death, at the foot of the tree of knowledge of good 
and evil. 

The cross is the emblem of the trials and sufferings 
of life, and, for us, an encouragement to accept them 
with resignation and to bear them with patience ; for it 
is by them principally that we make ourselves like unto 
the divine Crucified who is our Master and our 
Model. 

The cross is the Christian's book, whereon is written, 
in. the most eloquent language, the love, the tenderness, 
the infinite generosity of Jesus towards us. 

The Cross is a monument of the Omnipotence and 
divinity of Jesus Christ : from an infamous instrument, 
it has become the sign of glory and of triumph, the 
reward of heroic deeds, the ornament of the diadems of 
kings. Now, had its destiny been thus changed, 
except that He was God who touched it with his 
sacred hands and marked it with his blood ? . . . 

More yet will he do to glorify it ; for, at the last da}', 
he will present it all radiant to the eyes of all men, who 
shall see it shine like a star in the heavens. 

APPLICATION. 

Let us, henceforth, pay homage to the Cross of our 
Savior ; let us salute it with respect, let us kiss it with 
love and piety : let us often read that sacred book, in 
order to learn how Jesus has loved us, and what our 
salvation has cost him : we shall obtain, by this means, 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 209 

the grace to lead a truly Christian life, and we shall 
merit to be numbered with those who, at the last day, 
shall contemplate with happiness that sacred wood 
which they shall have made, on this earth, the object of 
their pious homage and profound veneration. 

Let us accept the sufferings and trials of life, with 
the greatest resignation, and in union with Jesus load- 
ing himself with his cross. Let us hear him exhorting 
us to imitate his patience : "If any man will come 
after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, 
and follow me."* 

Let us ask ourselves, in his holy presence, if we have 
worthily answered to his call — we who make profession of 
imitating him. 

How do we receive the Cross ? 

Is it not .with excessive repugnance, which we do not 
combat on supernatural motives, which if we did, would 
make us accept it with patience % 

Is it not with murmuring against those by whom it 
comes to us ? 

Is it not with an inordinate desire of being delivered 
from it, or yet of having another cross than that which 
is presented to us I 

Ah ! this is not being disciples of Jesus Christ ! No, 
we must not fear to carry the cross ; it opens the way 
to heaven ; in it are salvation and life : "In it," says 
the author of the Imitation, " is protection from 
enemies, infusion of heavenly sweetness, strength of 
mind, joy of spirit, height of virtue, perfection of 
sanctity."t 

* St. Matt., xvi. 24. f Imit., book ii., oh. xii. 2. 



210 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

PRAYER. 

May thy Cross, O Jesus ! speak eloquently to me of 
thy love for me ! may it powerfully excite me to accept 
with patience and resignation the troubles of life, which 
are the cross thou wouldst have me bear in thy train ! 
Grant, then, O my Savior ! that, through love for thee,. 
I may bear it courageously, and esteem myself happy 
to have by it some points of resemblance to thee. 

O adorable cross ! which hast been consecrated by 
the loving embraces of the only Son of God ; O wood 
infinitely precious ! the altar of his bloody sacrifice, I 
salute and revere thee ; thou art my refuge and mine 
only hope ; it is through thee I hope to obtain of my 
adorable Savior the grace of imitating him in his suffer- 
ings, to the end that I may be one day inseparably 
united with him in glory ! 

(See Resumes, page 399.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 211 

THIRTY-SIXTH MEDITATION. 
JESUS CARRIES HIS CROSS. 



" They led him out to crucify him." — St. Mark, xv. 20. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Who could comprehend the sufferings of Jesus loaded 
with his cross ! Let us contemplate him, Christian 
souls, setting out on that mysterious journey, which is 
to be caUed, from that moment, the Way of the Cross. 

The chiefs of the synagogue, who would not only 
have Jesus put to death, but also ruin him in the esti- 
mation of the people, do all that their infernal jealousy 
dictates to render his confusion greater, to make him 
contemptible in the eyes of the spectators : wherefore it 
is that that they make him walk to execution, in com- 
pany with two criminals, in order that he may be con- 
sidered as a malefactor. 

Oh ! what shame is felt by the Son of God, holiness 
itself, presented to the eyes of all as the most guilty of 
men ! What a triumph for the devil and the Jews who 
have no other end in view but to humble and degrade 
him ! What joy for the chiefs of the synagogue who 
succeed at last in drawing the multitude away from him, 
in making him odious and contemptible ! Their satis- 
faction appears on their face, and they take delight in 
loading our divine Savior with the most degrading and 



212 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

insulting epithets. The people imitating their chiefs, 
gather in crowds on the road to Calvary, and each one 
makes it a sort of merit to pay the Adorable Victim a 
tribute of insult and contempt. 

Meanwhile the death-train advances : the lictors go 
before with mournful trumpets ; then come the soldiers, 
the priests, and officers of the temple, then the execu- 
tioners ; in the midst of them walks the divine Victim 
followed by several chiefs of the synagogue who, min- 
gling with the mob, also utter the most revolting blas- 
phemy, and load with curses him who, having made him- 
self accursed, is led out of Jerusalem to be immolated for 
the sins of all.* 

All ! let us give ear to those tumultuous shouts, those 
insults offered to Jesus and his doctrine: is it possible 
to imagine humiliation greater than that which he 
experiences? Now is accomplished that prophecy of 
David : " For thy sake I have borne reproach ; shame 
hath covered my face. I am become a stranger to my 
brethren. . . . The reproaches of them that reproached 
thee are fallen upon me ; they that sat in the gate spoke 
against me ; and they that drank wine made me their 
song.*'f 

But this is. not all that he endures while journeying 
from the pretorium to Calvary ; for how many other 
sufferings overwhelm him ! His strength is exhausted, 
his body is covered with wounds ; his mangled flesh 
appears falling off in shreds ; the heavy cross where- 
with he is loaded rests but on one wound ; the crown 
of thorns still causes him the most excruciating tor- 
* Heb., xiii. 12. * Ps., lxviii. 8-13. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 213 

ment ; at every motion he makes it catches on the 
cross, renews the wounds of his adorable head, and 
sends a thrill of anguish to the very marrow of his 
bones ! 

All in him speaks of the excessive suifering he 
endures : his eyes are languishing, his lips livid, his 
features contracted, his mouth inflamed, his face bathed 
in sweat. . . 

He might be tracked by the divine blood that flows 
from his wounds, falls to the ground, and is trodden 
under foot by a cruel and sacrilegious multitude. 

Ah ! who would not be penetrated with the liveliest 
compassion, seeing the God of all sanctity suffer so 
many pains ! Who would not melt into tears at sight 
of that victim of our salvation, bearing on his mangled 
shoulder the wood of his sacrifice ! 

Let us remember, Christian souls, that he whom we 
contemplate dragged to the most infamous torture, is 
the divine Word, the perfect image* of the Father, the 
object of his eternal delight ; it is the Messiah promised 
to the earth ; it is the Redeemer of mankind ; it is the 
Son of promise in whom all nations shall be blessed,* 
but whom his own nation at this moment repudiates ; it 
is the Heir whom the master of the vineyard sent to 
demand fruit of the husbandmen, who cast him out of 
the vineyard to kill him and keep his inheritance.f 

In the eyes of men, who judge only by the outside, 

►it is a criminal going to the place of execution : in the 

eyes of the angels, it is the universal Pontiff and 

Victim of salvation entering into the sanctuary, to 

* Gen., xxii. 18. t St. Matt., xxi. 38. 



214 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

make the oblation of his blood to efface the sins of the 
world. 

Apparently, it is a criminal inspiring horror and dis- 
gust ; and, in reality, it is the Sovereign Master of heaven 
and earth, giving at this very moment lessons of the 
most sublime wisdom, and calling an infinite number of 
disciples who, like St. Paid,* will glory in the humilia- 
tion of the Cross. 

He walks on surrounded by a multitude of tierce men, 
like so many hungry dogs, and animated, as it were, by 
the fury of devils ; but he Avalks also accompanied by 
angels who form a guard of honor and endeavor to 
repair, by their profound adoration, the outrages inflicted 
on him. 

APPLICATION. 

For us, Christians, disciples of that suffering God, let 
us not content ourselves with deploring the crime of that 
outrageous multitude ; but, uniting with the angels who 
accompany him, let us prostrate ourselves in his presence 
and adore him ; let us, by our sincere homage, make 
him honorable amends for all he suffered from his enemies, 
going from the pretorium to Calvary. 

Let us interrogate this adorable Master; let us ask him 
why he suffers, and hear him answer that it is to merit 
for us the grace of salvation, to snatch us from the power 
of hell, to make us understand what an evil is that sin 
which has caused him so many sorrows. 4 

Let us hear him repeat : "If thou woiddst come after 
me, take up thy cross and follow me." 
* Gal., vi. 14. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 215 

All ! let us be docile to that divine invitation. 

Yes ! let us carry our cross courageously after our 
Master, let us bear it with faith, patience, and resigna- 
tion, and thus we shall become like unto that New Man 
to whom all the elect must be conformable.* 

Let us also propose to ourselves to always make the 
Way of the Cross with piety and attention. How 
touching is that practice whereby the faithful of all 
countries and of all periods follow in spirit the bloody 
footsteps of Jesus in his sorrowful journey, stop as often 
as he stopped, meditate on his sublime teachings, weep 
Avith him over the misfortune of sinners, excite them- 
selves, by the consideration of his numberless sufferings, 
to patience and resignation in the ills of this life ! 

Oh ! how dear should that holy exercise be to us ! 
It is Mary our Mother in heaven,, who first taught it by 
her example ; the Church has enriched it with the 
most precious indulgences ; and, after devotion to the 
Holy Eucharist, none is more proper to nourish our 
piety, to encourage us in good, and to make us strong 
against the devil. 

PRAYER. 

O Jesus, O Divine Lamb ! whom I consider going 
forth from Jerusalem, " loaded with the cross of our 
sins and the curses of the people," I acknowledge and 
adore thee as my Savior and my only hope. 

Suffer, holy Victim ! that I may follow thee in thy 
painful journey from the pretorium to Calvary, to weep 
for my sins which are the cause of thy sorrows, and also 
* Rom., viii. 29. 



216 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

to praise, exalt, and bless thee, and thus to repair by 
doing thee what honor I can, the insults heaped upon 
thee by the crowd that accompanies thee. 

Give me, O Lord! to enter into the spirit of the 
mysteries whereon I meditate when I have the happi- 
ness of making the way of the cross ! grant that the 
contemplation of what thou hast endured for me may 
inflame my heart with the most ardent charity, and 
render me patient and resigned in all the tribulations 
which it may please thee to have me suffer in this 
life! 

(See Resumes, page 399.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 217 



THIRTY-SEVENTH MEDITATION. 

JESUS FALLS UNDER THE WEIGHT OF 
HIS CROSS. 



The Lord hath laid on him the iniquities of us all."- 
Isa., liii. 6. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us contemplate our divine Savior started on the 
way to Calvary, journeying painfully along it, and leav- 
ing bloody footprints after him. 

Let us recall to our mind all he suffered, the cruel and 
odious manner in which he was treated, how he was 
taken from Grethsemane to Jerusalem, then from one 
tribunal to another ; let us remember his agony in the 
Garden of Olives, his bloody sweat, the scourging that 
covered his divine body with wounds and made him again 
shed blood profusely ; the crowning with thorns ; let us 
reflect, moreover, that since the evening before, he has 
not had the least nourishment, and ask ourselves to what 
a state of weakness he must be reduced ! . . . 

His strength is exhausted ; he is, as it were, dying, 
and he would, in fact, be dead, if he did not, by a 
miracle, retain in himself the breath of life which alone 
seems yet to animate him. 

. And yet he must climb the mount of sacrifice, bearing 

on his shoulder the wood on which he is to be immolated. 

10 



218 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

His enemies have loaded him with it, and now urge him 
on, impatient as they are to see him die. 

He ascends to Calvary, but slowly ; so the execu- 
tioners wax wroth, and, to make him go on, some drag 
him, others push him, all torment him with brutal inso- 
lence. 

Alas ! he cannot gratify their wishes. His march is 
more and more painful — it is plain that every step causes 
him the most excessive suffering. Soon he feels his 
knees bend and his last strength fail, and he falls under 
the weight of his cross. . . 

Let us contemplate him stretched on the ground, ly- 
ing motionless under his crushing load, surrounded by 
the inhuman crowd who gloat over his sufferings. . . . 
All ! who can conceive what he suffers ! his body all 
mangled sustains, as he falls, a horrible shock which he 
feels in every wound ; his arms and knees, already torn, 
are torn more still against the ground ; his head has 
struck against the ground, and the wood of the cross, 
and the thorns that encircle his brow, are driven 
farther in. 

And now he lies on the road like a dying man. No 
one draws near to assist him ; his state does not even 
excite pity in the hearts of his enemies. His fall is to 
them only an occasion of renewing the insults and out- 
rages wherewith they have loaded him ever since he 
has been in their hands. They cruelly beat and abuse 
him, to compel him to rise. 

God ! what a sight, and who can look upon it 
without shedding tears of compassion ! Let us shed those 
tears, and shed them in abundance : let us testify by 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 219 

them the part we take in the sufferings of our beloved 
King, who sacrifices himself for us. 

Let us behold him trying to rise : he leans on one 
side, he supports himself with his hands, places himself 
painfully on his knees, and rises little by little j bending 
then under his heavy burden, he journeys toward 
Calvary, where, alas ! he is only to arrive after several 
other falls, no less torturing for him than that we have 
been considering. 

But let us here make some reflections in connection 
with the spirit of the mystery we are contemplating. 

Jesus falls under the weight of his cross : what a 
subject of wonder ! he who sustains worlds by his all- 
powerful will, — be whom the prophets called the "Most 
High,"* "the Wonderful," "the Majesty," f appears 
but as the weakest and most miserable of men ! 

O Jesus ! art thou not the true Samson 1 Is not thy 
cross, as foretold by Isaiah, the sign of thy power ? 
How, then, is it become a burden which thou art not 
able to bear 1 

Ah ! I hear thee answer that it is less under that cross of 
wood thou dost fall, than under the pains of which it is 
the symbol, and which, at this moment, overwhelm thee 
all at once. 

Jesus sees the justice of his Father exercising all its 
severity on him ; he considers himself charged with the 
sins of all men — with that deluge of iniquity which began 
with the disobedience of Adam and Eve, and will con 
tinue to the consummation of ages. 

He thinks that he is going to die for all men ; and, 
* Ps., xcvi. !). t Isa., ix. 6. 



220 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

nevertheless, he sees a multitude of them, who, by 
reason of their perversity, will not profit by his sacrifice, 
and shall be lost for eternity. 

He considers also the negligence, the indifference, 
the apathy of so many souls who, although favored by 
his most precious graces, will not correspond, neverthe- 
less, with his designs upon them, and who, instead of 
serving him with more and more fervor, will languish 
in dreary tepidity. 

All this weighs on his soul much more than the 
heavy instrument of his execution weighs on his body. 

APPLICATION. 

Let us well understand that it is our sins that have 
overwhelmed our suffering Jesus, and which, according 
to the expression of the prophet, pushed him, and over- 
turned him that he might fall.* 

Let us Aveep, then, over those we have had the 
misfortune of committing, and with the tears of com- 
passion we shed over the divine Victim of our salva- 
tion, let us mingle the tears of true repentance. 

Let us never more allow ourselves to fall into sin : 
to act otherwise would be to drown the heart of Jesus 
in sorrow, it would be to add to the weight of his cross, 
it would be to join his executioners in heaping the 
most cruel outrages upon him. 

No, no, let us have no more of those fatal falls 

whereby we deliver om-selves to the power of the 

devils ; and if we have fallen, let us arise as soon as we 

can : Jesus has received that grace for us, together 

* Ps., cxvii. 13. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 221 

with that of walking courageously and trustingly in the 
way to heaven. 

Let us enter on it resolutely after him. and quit it no 
more. Doubtless, the enemy of good will attack us 
fiercely ; but through the cross we shall overcome him. 

Should we chance to fall under his blows, let us have 
recourse to Jesus, and arise. That divine Savior fell 
three times on the way to Calvary, to teach us that, 
whatever may be the number and the grievousness of 
our fall, we must not be discouraged, remembering that 
his mercy is boundless and the merits of his sacrifice 
infinite. 

Jesus, by having fallen under the weight of his cross, 
also teaches us, in the most sublime manner, patience 
and resignation ; insolently abused by his executioners, 
he bears it without anger, without a murmur ; he has 
only affection even for those who strike him most inhu- 
manly, and he offers his sufferings to Grod his Father, 
for them as for all other men. 

What an example ! . . . Let us often recall it, and 
let it make us calm in adversity, strong to bear all the 
contradictions and all the miseries of this life. 

Our trials are the cross we have to bear. Ah ! let 
us not dread that cross which is, besides, inevitable. 

Let us take it up in union with Jesus Christ ; and it 
will impart to us that strength which he merited for us 
by his passion, and by which so many martyrs and con- 
fessors of fhe faith have found that sufferings and death 
are not only not to be dreaded by the Christian, but that 
they may be for him a cause of true consolation and 
ineffable joy. 



222 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

PRAYER. 

I have contemplated thee, O Jesus ! falling under 
the weight of thy cross, and thou hast made me under- 
stand that my sins were the cause thereof. 

Ah ! grant, I beseech thee, that I may bewail them 
sincerely, that I may do real penance for them, and 
never commit them more. I ask it of thee through the 
merits of thy carrying of the cross, and through the 
intercession of thy most holy Mother compassionating 
thy sufferings. 

(See Resumes, page 400.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 223 

THIRTY-EIGHTH MEDITATION. 
JESUS MEETS HIS BLESSED MOTHER. 



And thy own soul a sword shall pierce." — St. Luke, ii. 35. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Mary, informed by the apostles of the apprehension 
of Jesus in the garden of Olives, comprehends that the 
moment was come for the fulfilment of the prophecies 
relating to the Messiah, and consequently, of that 
which was addressed to herself by the holy old man 
Simeon, when he said : " Thy own soul a sword shall 
pierce." 

Wishing, then, to know more particularly what was 
taking place, she hastens in the morning to go, if 
possible, to her divine Son, in order to assist him as 
far as she can, or, at least, to console him in his 
sufferings. 

Ah ! doubtless, she would have gone into the palace of 
Caiaphas, into that of Herod, into the pretorium even j 
but she is prevented by the crowd. According to the 
opinion of several Fathers, she could see Jesus when 
Pilate presented him to the Jews in his bloody insignia 
of mock royalty, and heard the people cry, " Let him 
die ; crucify him." She also heard the sentence pro- 



224 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

What trials for her maternal heart! What grief 
penetrates that heart, and what tears it makes her 
shed ! 

Soon Jesus goes forth from the pretorium bearing his 
cross, and Mary goes to place herself where she may 
see him pass. 

Meanwhile the divine Savior advances on his sorrow- 
ful wav ; he is a prey to the insults and maledictions of 
a whole people ; his heart is utterly desolate. He looks 
through the crowd in search of even the faintest sign of 
pity on some face ; but he sees only hatred and 
inhumanity, and he says : " I looked for one that would 
grieve together with me, but there was none : and for 
one that would comfort me, and I found none."* 

No, O Lord ! thou shalt not bear thy divine sorrows 
alone ; the heart of thy most holy Mother is too closely 
bound up with thine not to feel every torment that is 
inflicted on thee. Yes, she compassionates thy suffer- 
ings, and in her person, the entire Church. 

But see ! the dismal procession approaches the place 
where she is ; soon the lictors who open the march 
pass before her ; the soldiers follow, then some of the 
chief priests and officers of the temple,— ail blaspheming 
ao-ainst Jesus. Ah ! she heeds them not ; her tearful 
eyes seek another object ; they wander over the ascend- 
ing crowd, and all at once are fixed. . . 

Oh ! what a sorrowful contemplation for Mary ! She 

beholds her adorable Son exhausted, disfigured, his face 

bedaubed with spittle, blood, and dust, his brow 

crowned with thorns, a rope round his neck, in com- 

* Ps.. Iwiii. -2\. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 225 

pany with two ruffians, walking painfully along, over- 
whelmed beneath the weight of the instrument of his 
torture, blasphemed by the people, ill-treated by the 
soldiers ! 

What torments ! and who could conceive them ? they 
are proportionate to her love for Jesus, and that love is 
unbounded. 

Mary bears at this moment in her heart the cross 
which Jesus bears on his shoulder, and on which he is 
going to die. She is overwhelmed with an immense 
load of sorrow and anguish. The horrible sufferings 
of her divine Son rend her soul : she suffers the most 
cruel martyrdom, or rather all martyrdom together. 

O tender Mother ! how coidd it be explained unless 
by a miracle, that thou didst not die while con- 
templating the terrible spectacle placed before thine 
eyes ! 

Meanwhile Jesus has reached the spot where his 
divine Mother awaits him. He looks upon her : ah ! 
for him what a subject of pain, what a heart-rending 
sight ! he sees that beloved mother plunged on his 
account in an ocean of grief. His cross is very heavy, 
the wounds which his crown of thorns is making and 
those with which his whole body is covered, are most 
acute — but the sight of his mother is the keenest of all 
his sufferings. 

He would wish to address to her at least some words 
of consolation ; but the fury of the Jews brutally urges 
him on. Mary on her side would wish to give him 
some token of her love, to press him to her heart, wipe 
his face, take his cross and carry it herself; but they will 



226 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

not allow her to go near her Jesus, who moves on with 
his tearful eyes fixed on her. 

Ah ! who can tell us the mystery of that sorrowful 
meeting and those mutual looks. Jesus suffers in 
seeing Mary suffer, and Mary, in seeing Jesus suffer. 
And so in this mute interchange of love, the Son and the 
Mother feel the greatest affliction. Mary feels through 
compassion all the sufferings of Jesus, while the suffer- 
ings of Jesus are increased by those of Mary : there is, 
therefore, an increasing progression of pains, which 
shall cease only when the divine Mother of the Savior 
has suffered in her soul all that she can suffer. 

Let us contemplate Mary, who closely follows Jesus 
while bearing his cross — ascending after him the 
mountain of Calvary where she shall witness his immola- 
tion — watering with her tears the bloody prints he 
haves behind him. . . . 

< ) Mary ! ( ) most desolate of mothers ! thou art tin; 
Queen of martyrs. No, we cannot conceive affliction 
greater than thine : no, never could any one say with 
so much truth : " O all ye that pass by the way, attend, 
and see if there be any sorrow like to my sorrow !"* 

- APPLICATION. 
Let us not content ourselves with a sterile compas- 
sion for Mary : let us ask ourselves why she had to 
suffer, she who never sinned, — why Jesus did not 
remove from the lips of his most holy and immaculate 
Mother, the chalice which he himself could hardly 
drink. 

* Lament., i. 12. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 227 

It is that, united to her Son by the most intimate 
union, it could not be but she would share his 
and feel them as her own. 
grace than any other creature, she was the first to 
respond to that call which Jesus made to all, to take up 
their cross and follow him. It is also that, being the 
co-redemptress of men, she was to suffer for our sins 
with the adorable Victim who took them upon him. It 
is that, "the Man of sorrows" being the model of 
the elect, it was expedient that she who is the 
most perfect copy of that model, might also be 
called " the Mother of sorrows." It is, . moreover, 
that Mary represented the Church, and the Church 
was to be associated in the sufferings of her divine 
Spouse. 

Let us pause on the thought that Mary suffered on 
account of our sins. Yes, it is we who, in committing 
them, laid sacrilegious hands on her amiable Son, and 
disfigured, struck, tormented him ; we who have 
placed upon him the crown of thorns and the infamous 
cross, and who have presented him in that dolorous state 
to her maternal eyes ! How cruel we have been to that 
sweet Savior and his divine Mother ! Let us weep, 
then* for our sins, and be firmly resolved to commit 
them no more. 

Let us do penance fen? all those of our past life, and 
to that end, let us apply ourselves to follow Jesus bear- 
ing his cross — and to follow him with resignation, 
courage, and love, notwithstanding the repugnance of 
our nature. 

Let us often, at least in spirit, make the Way of the 



228 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

Cross in union with Mary traversing the road to 
Calvary ; like her, let us with our whole heart com- 
passionate Jesus suffering. 

Let us ask the assistance of Mary for poor sinners, 
who are also her children, and who, alas ! present them- 
selves to her eyes burdened with the weight of their 
transgressions, bound by their evil habits, surrounded by 
devils, and horribly disfigured by sin. Ah ! let us pray 
to her for them, in order that she may obtain their 
deliverance. Let us pray to her also for ourselves 
who are her children, and are climbing so painfully the 
wav we have to go. following Jesus. 

PRAYEK. 
Mary ! remember thou art our mother, and look 
upon thy children toiling along after Jesus on the way 
to Calvary. Behold our weakness, our exhaustion, 
our pains ; lie touched with our sufferings, and follow, 
O our mother! the dictates of thy compassionate heart. 
Come and help us ; thou canst do so, O Mary ! there is 
no guard to keep Thee from coming and holding out to us 
a helping hand. Obtain for us that we may correspond 
with the greatest fidelity to the call of thy divine Son, 
and follow his footsteps even unto death ! $ 

(See Rksumeb, page 400.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 229 



THIRTY-NINTH MEDITATION. 



SIMON OF CYRENE ASSISTS JESUS TO CARRY 
HIS CROSS. 



' They found a man of Cyrene named Simon ; him they forced 
to take up his cross." — St. Matt., xxvii. 32. 



CONSIDERATION. 

The Jews, having seen Jesus fall from weakness, 
while ascending Mount Calvary, feared, says Denis the 
Carthusian, that he might die on the way, and thus 
deprive them of the barbarous pleasure of seeing him 
expire on the cross ; wherefore, not to relieve his pain, 
but rather to prolong it, they stopped a man of Cyrene 
who was passing that way returning from the fields, and 
compelled him to carry the cross after him. 

Oh ! but this circumstance, mentioned in the holy 
Gospel, is fruitful in salutary instruction ! While all 
here seems to be the effect of chance, yet it is pre- 
ordained with an admirable economy. 

Jesus would have a stranger assist him in carrying his 
cross — now, that stranger represented the Gentiles who 
would embrace the true religion : it is, therefore, all of 
us who, in the person of the Cyrenean, are called to 
take part in the sufferings of Jesus Christ, to bear the 
Cross with him, to apply to ourselves the merits of his 
sacrifice, by accomplishing in ourselves that which, 



230 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

according to St. Paul, is wanting, of his passion.* Our 
redemption could not be effected without ourselves. As 
members of Jesus Christ, we ought to suffer with our 
head : let us understand this well, and accept with 
resignation, and even with joy, the share he wills us to 
take in his sufferings. He, our God, went before us; 
he suffered first ; he ennobled the cross by touching it 
with his divine hands and carrying it on his shoulder, 
and that ennobling is become common to all the pains 
and afflictions of life, which it represented. Ah ! should 
we not be not only patient in our trials, but glory in 
suffering ? 

The meeting with Simon the Cyrenean, takes place 
when Jesus had already traversed the greater part of 
the way, and when he is within a few paces of the 
summit of Calvary — this teaches us that the share he 
gives us in his sufferings is very slight compared with 
that which he keeps for himself ; that he reserved for 
himself the greatest pains, that he asks but a little 
thing from us to make us participators in the merits of 
his sacrifice. 

The Jews act freely and from a criminal motive, 
when they compel the Cyrenean to help Jesus to carry 
his cross ; and yet they are doing what God willed in 
relation to that man, who, on this occasion, represented 
all those who are converted to Christianity. Let us 
learn from this that the designs of God are always ac- 
complished, and that, while respecting human liberty, 
that Sovereign Master effects whatsoever his providence 
decrees. 

* Col., i. 24. 



OF OUE LORD JESUS CHRIST. 231 

Simon is highly honored by touching the Savior's 
precious cross, helping him to carry it, assisting thus at 
the great sacrifice of the supreme Pontiff, the priest of 
the great immolation 5 but at this moment he does not 
understand it. He sees only pain and shame attached to 
the act which he is commanded to do, and as far as it 
depends on him, he refuses ; he obeys only because he is 
obliged to do so, and doubtless complains within him- 
self of the violence done him. 

Oh ! it is thus Ave act when Jesus calls us to bear the 
cross with him ! we view things as ' human nature 
directs ; we see only the repugnance of our nature for 
suffering and humiliation, and not the honor and the 
spiritual advantage that there is in bein^humbled with 
Jesus and for his sake ; we regard only creatures in the 
trials that overtake us, and so it happens that we com- 
plain of the injustice of men in things which are the 
effect of the special protection of God in our favor. . . 

Simon refuses to bear the cross, but, nevertheless, he 
is obliged to bear it ; so it is with us. In vain do we 
refuse to accept the tribulations of life ; we are com- 
pelled to undergo them, and our refusal serves only 
to make them more painful. 

The cross is inevitable : " Dispose and order all things 
according as thou wilt, and as seems best to thee, and 
thou wilt still find something to suffer. The cross is 
always ready, and every where awaiteth thee. Turn 
thyself upward or turn thyself downward ; turn thy- 
self inward or turn thyself outward, every where thou 
shalt find the cross, and every where thou must of 
necessity hold fast patience. If thou carry the cross 



232 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

willingly, it will carry thee, and bring thee to thy desired 
end ; namely, to that place where there will be an end 
of suffering, though here there will be no end. If thou 
carry it unwillingly thou makest it a burden to thee, 
and loadest thyself the more, and, nevertheless, thou 
must bear it."* 

Simon at first carries the cross against his will ; but 
by degrees his mind is enlightend from above, his heart 
is inflamed with a divine ardor, and he no longer feels 
either fatigue or reluctance ; grace triumphs over 
nature ; he comprehends the dignity to which God has 
called him ; he experiences that following Jesus — which 
appeared hard — becomes easy and even agreeable ; and 
instead of complaining of the choice made of him, he 
blesses the Lord for it and desires to suffer more to 
please him. 

And this is the case with all Christians when they 
accept in a spirit of faith, and in union with our Lord, 
the pains and humiliations of this life: "Such a one, 
thus many ways afflicted, is not without some relief or 
consolation ; because he is sensible of the very great 
profit he reaps by bearing the cross. For whilst he 
willingly resigns himself to it, all the burden of tribula- 
tion is converted into an assured hope of comfort from 
God. And the more the flesh is brought down by 
affliction, the more is the spirit strengthened by interior 
grace." t 

The cross is given up to Simon by Jesus who then 
walks before him ; and that is to make us comprehend 
that the cross that will save us, is that which God wills 
* imit., book ii., ch. xii. 4, 5. + Ibid., 8. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 233 

us to bear, and not that which we would have chosen 
ourselves ; that, in order to have it sanctify us, we 
must accept that cross in union with our Lord and with 
the sentiments that were his. 

APPLICATION. 

Let us raise ourselves above nature, and direct our 
course only according to the principles of the Holy- 
Gospel and the example of the Savior ; let us always 
regard with the eyes of faith the trials and humiliations 
of life, especially those which belong to our state : they 
are the cross that Jesus presents to us, and tells us to 
bear after him. Let us be not ashamed to accept the 
cross, since our God was not ashamed to load himself 
first with it, and in doing so sanctified it. 

Let us not judge our cross by material feelings, but 
by the light of grace ; let us value it as the saints 
valued theirs, as we shall value it at the moment of 
death ; or rather as we shall value it when we are in 
heaven, where we shall understand so well that God 
chastises here below those whom he loves, that he makes 
those whom he destines for eternal glory, pass through 
the crucible of tribulation. 

Let us consider the trials that come to us by men 
as coming from God himself, and profit by them to 
make ourselves like unto Jesus Christ, and increase our 
merit for heaven. 

Courage and confidence ! ah ! our cross is very light 
if we compare it with that of Jesus Christ, or to what 
we deserve to bear ! Besides, our Lord precedes us, 
he encourages and strengthens us; let us walk, then, 



234 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

resolutely in his train, putting in practice that exhorta- 
tion which he addresses to us, especially to us Religious : 
" If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, 
and take up his cross, and folloAv me." * 

PRAYER. 

Thou callest me, O Jesus ! to bear thy cross and 
follow thee : this is, I know, a very great mark of thy 
affection, it is a proof that thou dost destine me one day 
to share thy glory ; and why am I unwilling to take it 
up ? . . . Alas ! I consider only the pain and trouble, 
and not the advantages I may find therein. Have pity 
on my blindness and weakness ; enlighten me with a 
ray of thy light, Word of God ! to the end that I may 
appreciate it, and may have the courage to offer myself 
to bear it in union with thee. 

(See Resumes, page 401.) 



* St. Matt., xvi. 24. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 235 

FORTIETH MEDITATION. 
A PIOUS WOMAN WIPES THE FACE OF JESUS. 



"Who shall comfort thee ?"— Isa., li. 19. 

CONSIDERATION. 

Let us contemplate our divine Savior continuing to 
climb the road to Calvary j let us consider him over- 
come with fatigue, suffering unheard-of pains, his soul 
sorrowful, his heart oppressed with anguish. 

O Jesus ! how lamentable is thy state, and under what 
an aspect thou dost present thyself to our eyes ! Oh ! 
too truly, alas ! is that prophecy of Isaiah accomplished 
at this moment : " We have seen him ... a man of 
sorrows, whereupon we esteemed him not."* The 
most beautiful of the children of men is horribly 
disfigured ;• that august face, the object of the con- 
templation of angels, and which is to make the 
beatitude of the saints, is covered with blood and 
spittle, dust and sweat 5 that countenance that revealed 
all the beauty of a divine soul, and which was the 
delight of the Eternal Father himself, horrified those 
who looked upon it. 

Ah ! is that the face which Mary and Joseph covered 
with kisses, that face which the old man Simeon was 
+ Isa.. liii. 2, 3. 



236 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

contemplating when he exclaimed: "Now thou dost 
dismiss thy servant, O Lord ! in peace, because my eyes 
have seen thy salvation ... a light to the revelation 
of the Gentiles, and the glory of thy people Israel."* 

No, never was man found in a state so worthy of 
compassion ! 

And yet, with the exception of his blessed Mother and 
Simon the Cyrenean, not one amongst all the immense 
crowd that surrounds him, came forward to console and 
relieve him : pity seems to be extinguished in every 
heart ; Jews and Romans alike are actuated by hatred 
and cruelty towards him, or remain most shamefully 
indifferent. 

Doubtless, there is in that multitude a great number 
of those who have admired the sublimity of his teachings, 
or whom he fed with miraculous bread in the desert, or 
cured of their infirmities ; yet no one presents himself to 
take up his defence, to protest against the injustice of 
which he is the victim, or procure for him any relief. 
What weakness ! What injustice ! 

Nevertheless, a pious woman has placed herself in 
the divine Savior's way ; she, like Mary, wishes to 
express to him, at least by a look, the compassion she 
feels ; she wishes to bring some comfort to his divine 
heart, by showing him that there are still souls who 
unite with him, who still burn with pure love. 

She casts her eyes over the dreary procession, and 

perceives her beloved Redeemer. But when she sees 

him in that frightful state, she feels her heart breaking 

within her ; her eyes fill with tears ; her soul, penetrated 

* St. Luke, ii. 29-32. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 237 

with the liveliest compassion, suffers from all the 
sufferings of Jesus ; she is occupied only with senti- 
ments of pity which are the more powerful the more she 
loves her Savior, and sees him destitute of succor. Thus 
she calculates not, she reflects on nothing, she allows 
herself to pause on no consideration ; but, prompt as 
the charity by which she is animated, she makes her 
way through the astonished soldiers, gets close to Jesus, 
bends before him and then wipes his adorable face . . . 

Oh ! how touching is that trait of genuine compas- 
sion ! Oh ! how well that holy woman deserves to be 
presented to our admiration in the sixth station of the 
cross ! 

Jesus Christ, to reward her for the act of charity she 
had performed, vouchsafed to leave the imprint of his 
august face on the white veil she had used ; and thus 
she was the first to have an image of Jesus suffering — 
and an image traced by himself! 

What a precious favor ! What a rich treasure that 
holy and true likeness must have been to her ! With 
what piety, what emotion, what love she contemplated 
and venerated it ! 

How many times she must have kissed with the most 
profound respect the impression of that adorable face, 
the sacred features of Jesus immolating himself for 
men ! 

No, the face of our divine Savior, although horribly 
disfigured, is not an object of aversion to this woman, 
she turns not away from it ; on the contrary, she 
makes it the object of her most delightful contemplation. 

Ah ! it is that, enlightened by faith, she discovers a 



238 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

ravishing beauty under that exterior so hideous to the 
natural eye : that bruised and mangled face is truly 
that of the Christ-king, of him who is the splendor of 
God his Father ; and the blood, the spittle, and the dust by 
-\\ Inch it is covered, are but eloquent voices that tell her 
how much he loved men. . . . 

This prodigy, wrought in favor of that holy woman, is 
also the figure of the special graces and signal favors 
which God often grants, even in this world, to generous 
souls who have the courage to overcome themselves in 
difficult occasions. That divine Savior shows them the 
features of his adorable face, and leaves them deeply 
imprinted in their heart, in order to sustain and encour- 
age them in the accomplishment of the duties imposed 
upon them by their love for him and their devotion to 
his service. 

APPLICATION. 

To us also, Christian souls, our divine Savior shows 
himself in a state of suffering calculated to excite our 
compassion. Yes, he shows himself to us in the person 
of the poor, the unhappy, the sick, of those for whom 
we feel an aversion, perchance disgust : ah ! could we 
behold him with indifference ! Could we refuse to 
render him what service we can ! We piously vener- 
ate the image of his august face, the crucifix, and all 
that recalls our divine Savior : but do we remember that 
the sick and unhappy, whosoever they be, are the 
living images of Jesus suffering ? let us be, therefore, 
respectful and affectionate to them. 

Let the corn-age of this holy woman, who fearlessly 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 239 

makes her way through the soldiers to do a service to a 
condemned criminal on his way to execution, make us 
understand how efficacious is the grace of Grod in docile 
souls 5 how it makes them strong, generous, superior to 
themselves. Let us have confidence, then, in that divine 
assistance which is given us when occasion requires, 
and by which we may triumph over our natural feelings 
and practise courageously the Christian and religious 
virtues. 

Let the image of Jesus suffering be really the object 
of our worship ; let us carry it about us, and kiss it with 
piety, love, and gratitude. Let us place it in our heart ; 
let us often recall it to our imagination, and always in 
producing the most sincere acts of thanksgiving and 
love to our generous Redeemer. 

Would to God that our soul, having no affection for 
creatures, might be compared to the white veil made 
use of by the pious woman who wiped the face of Jesus, 
and on which there was no other impression ! Ah ! 
what happiness for us if it were so ! Our soul would 
be conformable to him who is the model of the predesti- 
nated 5* Jesus would recognize himself in it, and at the 
moment of our death he would reward us by making 
himself the object of our eternal contemplation. 

PRAYER. 

O Jesus ! the fairest of the children of men, in what a 

state thou appearest to us at the moment when thou 

climbcst Calvary ! With what grief and compassion 

thou inspirest me ! ah ! why can I not, like that holy 

* Rom., viii. 29. 



240 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

woman on whose courageous action I am meditating, 
wipe away the dust, the sweat, the blood with which thy 
face is covered ! why can I not, like her, preserve on a 
veil the imprint of thy features, that I might constantly 
fasten my eyes upon it, put it often to my lips, and kiss 
it with the greatest veneration ! 

But what I desire is not impossible to me, for the 
service which that holy woman rendered to thee, O my 
Savior ! I may render to thee, by exercising charity 
towards my brethren and my pupils, especially those 
for whom I feel any natural dislike ; and thy holy 
image I have in the crucifix, in my suffering brethren, 
in my heart, where I beseech thee to engrave more and 
more thy divine features, so that at my death thy Father 
may recognize me by my likeness to thee, and admit 
me to contemplate with the elect thy now radiant face, 
which makes the felicity of the angels and Saints in 
heaven. 

(See Resumes, page 401.) 



OF OUE LORD JESUS CHRIST. 241 

FORTY-FIRST MEDITATION. 
JESUS CONSOLES THE HOLY WOMEN. 



; ' Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not over me ; but weep for 
yourselves, and for your children."— St. Luke, xxiii. 28. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us contemplate our divine Savior ascending 
Calvary, and drawing near to the place of his sacrifice. 

His executioners have relieved him of his cross ; but 
as it was less that wood that crushed him than the weight 
of our sins, he is still weak and languishing, and walks 
but with the greatest pain. The immense crowd around 
him continues to insult him and blaspheme his holy name. 
The Jews are eager to see him fastened to the cross and 
raised before the eyes of all. 

Nevertheless, some holy women, touched with com- 
passion, follow him weeping and lamenting. They thus 
manifest their love for that sweet Savior, and their 
horror of the deicide which the Jews are committing. 

Oh ! doubtless this proof of affection consoles the 
heart of Jesus, doubtless he accepts the tears of those 
pious persons : and yet he seems to be indifferent to them. 
Even as he appeared insensible to his triumph on his 
entrance into Jerusalem, he appears insensible to the 
part they now take in his pains and his "humiliation. 
His sufferings arc excessive, and his degradation at its 
11 



242 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

height ; but he heeds it not : he forgets himself to think 
only of the salvation of men. 

Turning towards the holy women, he looks on them 
kindly, and even by that look he consoles, and loads 
them with his graces. Then instructing them, and all 
of us in their person, he tells them : " Daughters of 
Jerusalem, weep not over me ; but weep for yourselves 
and for your children. For if in the green wood they do 
these things, what shall be done in the dry ? "* 

Oh ! but these words are worthy of our most serious 
meditation ! 

" Weep not over me." — But, Lord, art thou not in 
the most lamentable state ? Oh ! how could we, 
beloved of our hearts, contemplate thee covered with 
wounds, overwhelmed with opprobrium, about to be 
crucified, and not feel ourselves penetrated with the 
liveliest compassion ? How can we see thee shedding 
thy blood, and not mingle our tears with it ? . . . 

Yet thou sayest to us : " Weep not over me." Ah ! 
I understand, it is not to forbid us to weep over thee ; 
but it is to manifest the generosity of thy heart. It is 
as if thou saidst : " This is the day I have so ardently 
desired, it is that of the baptism wherewith 1 am to be 
baptized and after which I have sighed for thirty-three 
years. My love will only be satisfied when I have given 
my life for the salvation of the world. Behold, now the 
moment is come. Disturb not by your tears the joy 
of my heart." 

11 Weep not over me ; but," adds the divine Master, 
" weep for yourselves and for your children." Weep 
* St. Luke, xxiii. 28, 31. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 243 

over your sins and those of your people 5 weep over the 
woes they have brought on you and them. 

Thus he teaches us that if it be reasonable to deplore 
an evil, it is much more so to deplore that which has 
caused it ; that his torments and his ignominy, excessive 
as they are, ought less to provoke our tears than the sins 
which caused them. 

It is our sins that have delivered him to his enemies, 
which have mangled his body under the blows of rods 
and whips, and drawn the blood from his veins ; it is 
our sins that have plaited and placed on his brow the 
crown of thorns, and disfigured his august visage ; it is 
our sins that have laid the cross on his bruised shoulder ; 
it is our sins that are going to pierce his hands and his 
feet, and to take his life away : they should, therefore, 
be the first subject of our tears. 

" Weep for yourselves and for your children." — The 
divine Savior, whose heart is an abyss of kindness and 
tenderness, thinks less of his sufferings than of the mis- 
fortunes of the people to whom he was sent, — the people 
whom he would have saved and who will not let him save 
them. He repeats his predictions on ungrateful Jeru- 
salem. Speaking of its inhabitants, he said: "The 
time shall come when they will begin to say to the 
mountains, ' Fall on us,' and to the hills, ' Cover us.' "* 

O amiable heart of my Jesus ! thou forgettest thy 
sorrows to mourn over the miseries that await thy people, 
and to induce them to prevent them. Deal as mercifully 
with us. Teach us what misfortunes impend over us, 
and, by thy grace, make us avoid them. 
* St. Luke, xxiii. 30. 



244 MEDITATIONS OX THE PASSION 

The divine Master ends with these words, which are 
so fit to strike us with terror: "For if in the green 
wood they do these things, what shall be done in the 
dry ?"* If the fire of divine justice is so active on me, 
a green tree, laden with flowers and fruits, what will it 
do on the sinner who is but dry wood, barren and use- 
less ? ... If such are the evils that overwhelm me 
for having merely taken the appearance of sin, what 
must not those expect who have the reality of it ? 

Oh ! the sublime lesson that Jesus gives us in these 
few words ! Why do we not comprehend them ? why 
not conform our conduct to them 1 

APPLICATION. 

In union with the holy women of Jerusalem, let us 
compassionate the sorrows of Jesus ; let us take part in 
what he suffers, remembering, furthermore, that he 
suffers on account of us and for us. 

Let us weep over him ; but as he exhorts us, let us 
weep rather for ourselves. Let xis bewail the spiritual 
miseries that beset us ever since the day of the first sin. 
Oh ! but we have reason to shed tears of compassion for 
ourselves ! 

Let us weep for our sins, whereby we have over- 
whelmed the divine Victim of our redemption with 
sorrow and ignominy ; but let us bewail them sincerely. 
Let us commence, this very hour, a truly penitent life, 
and so procure for the heart of Jesus the consolation he 
most demands of us, and which will merit for us a share 
in the fruits of his sacrifice. 

* St. Luke, xxiii. 31. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 245 

Alas ! woe to us, if we weep not for our sins, and do 
not do true penance for them ! Woe to us if, during our 
life, we are but dry wood, a useless sapling, cut off 
from Jesus — from him who is the true vine to which we. 
must be united, and by which alone we can bear fruits 
of salvation and find favor before God ! 

Let us also expiate the sins of other men, and particu- 
larly those of our relations, thinking of the outrage 
those inflict on God, the injury they cause to their 
authors, the woes they bring on the earth. 

Let us be more and more penetrated with the fear of 
divine justice, and apply ourselves to prevent its rigors. 
Alas ! it may be that we do nothing for that end ! Let 
us examine before our divine Savior, and ask ourselves, 
whether we are not that dry wood to which he alludes 
in the words on which we have been meditating. Is 
there in us the spirit of faith and charity which, like 
vivifying sap, produces fruits of sanctincation and 
salvation ; or are we not withered up by pride, vanity, 
onvyj sensuality, which render the soul insensible to the 
things of God and barren in good works, and which 
call down the divine vengeance on themselves ? 

PRAYER. 
Thou dost tell us, O Jesus ! not to weep over thee, 
but over ourselves. Ah ! permit me, O my divine 
Master ! to let my heart give way to the sentiments of 
compassion which thy state inspires. Yes, let me weep 
over thee, weep over thy sorrows greater than all 
sorrows : but, according to thy word, vouchsafe to 
grant me that T may weep rather for myself, because T 



246 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

have had the misfortune to offend thee, and to have 
been by my sins the cause of thy sufferings. 

Grant, I beseech thee, that weeping over thee and 
over myself, I may participate in the merits of thy holy 
passion ; and persevering in the accomplishment of my 
duties, I may be before thee not that dry wood which 
thou didst curse, but that green wood to which thou 
comparest thyself, and which merits to be transplanted 
to the gardjens of the heavenly Sion. 

O holy daughters of Jerusalem ! who did not fear to 
openly manifest your compassion for your divine 
Redeemer, obtain for me strength to pronounce always 
generously for him, and to walk courageously in his 
train on the way of Calvary, which is alone for us the 
way of heaven. 

(See Resumes, page 402.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 24] 

FORTY-SECOND MEDITATION. 
JESUS STRIPPED OF HIS GARMENTS. 



They stripped him of his outside eoat." — Gen., xxxvii. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us contemplate our divine Savior arrived at the 
summit of Calvary. It is the terminus of the dolorous 
way he had to traverse ; but would, alas ! that he had 
reached the terminus of his sufferings ! It seems even 
that all those wherewith he has been overwhelmed — the 
agony, the bloody sweat, the scourging, the crown of 
thorns, the carrying of the cross, — were but the 
prelude to what he was yet to endure. All that did 
but slacken some sparks of the fire of divine wrath, 
which was to be wholly exhausted on him who had 
made himself the victim of sin. 

On Calvary it was that divine justice waited to strike 
him in all its rigor. 

He arrives at the rock where he is to be lifted up on 
the cross ; the crowd gathers around, in order to satisfy 
the cruel curiosity to see him crucified. 

Jesus looks before and around him : what a horrible 
picture meets his eve ! Here the cross, the nails, the 
executioners : there, the Pharisees insulting him by 
their sacrilegious mockery ; farther on, the crowd load- 
ing him with curses. . . 



248 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

As he had done in the Garden of Olives, he again 
fixes his mind on the multitude of impenitent sinners 
who will not profit by his sacrifice. Then his soul feels 
the greatest desolation, and his strength failing him, he 
falls at the feet of his executioners, who are arranging 
all for the bloody execution. 

It was the custom to give to the condemned, before 
crucifying them, a draught of wine and myrrh, which 
had the effect of benumbing their sensibility in the midst 
of their torments. This should have been given to 
Jesus : but alas ! by a cruelty worthy of their previous 
cruelty, the Jews gave him vinegar and gall, thus ful- 
filling what David had said : " They gave me gall for 
my food."* 

Pie refuses not to put that bitter draught to his lips : 
he tastes it in order to expiate our sins of sensuality ; but 
he refuses to drink it, so that nothing might diminish 
the sufferings by which he desires to satisfy for us. 

Meanwhile the signal is given to execute the cruel 
warrant granted by Pilate ; the executioners brutally 
lay hold of the divine criminal and tear off his 
garments. 

Oh ! who coidd conceive what Jesus suffers from this 
barbarous stripping ! His robe, the only covering laid 
on his divine body, was glued to his adorable flesh by 
the blood he had shed : but in tearing it violently off 
him, they re-open each of his wounds, they make him 
feel anew all the tortures of the scourging, and inflict 
upon him such pain as makes one shudder to think of. 

To the sufferings of the body are here added the 
* Ps., lxviii. 22. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 249 

more painful sufferings of the soul. , To what a fearful 
state Jesus is reduced ! to what an abyss of humilia- 
tion he has sunk ! 

Behold him, Christian souls, like a victim who had 
been flayed before being immolated, and who lay panting 
at the foot of the altar of sacrifice. His sacred members 
present a shapeless mass of mangled flesh ; his divine 
blood streams from every part of his body, which is 
itself bf[t one wound. 

Alas ! He who bedecks the meadows with their 
verdure and their flowers, he who gives the birds their 
plumage, he who adorns the sun with his radiant 
splendors, has not a rag to cover him! The King of 
earth, the Master of heaven, has for royal mantle only 
the bruises that men have made on him, and the blood 
that oozes from them. . . . 

Angels of heaven, come, then, to your Lord! cover 
with your wings his divine body, hide it from the eyes 
of those wretched blasphemers who so shamefully out- 
rage the supreme King — he before whom you prostrate 
yourselves to adore in him the very splendor of God. 

Rut, no ; Jesus consents not to receive the visible 
assistance of the angels : he wishes to expiate the mis- 
fortune we have had in losing, by sin, the robe of 
innocence wherein we were arrayed in baptism, and 
which was given us by our mother the Holy Church, 
as his own tunic had been given him by his holy 
mother the Blessed Virgin Mary. He wishes to make 
us comprehend the state of misery in which the soul is 
that has no longer the robe of grace ; and how much he 
suffers when vice and impiety separate from him the 



250 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

souls which, being united to him by charity, are, as it 
were, the glorious garment of his mystic body. 

He wishes to show us to what degree he practised 
poverty, and to teach us that he Avas at his death, as at 
his birth, wholly deprived of earthly goods. 

He wishes to teach men generously to renounce all, 
and to strip themselves of earthly things, that they may 
become like unto him and apply to themselves the merits 
of his sacrifice. 



APPLICATION. 

How many lessons does our divine Master give us in 
this circumstance of his dolorous Passion ! 

Let us understand them and put them in practice. 

Let us deplore our sins which have despoiled us of the 
robe of innocence, which have ravished our soul of all 
its beauty, and rendered it an object of horror in the 
sight of God : the Church told us, on the day of our 
baptism, to preserve with care the white robe where- 
with she clothed us ; but alas ! in sinning, we have 
thrown it off and cast it far away. 

Let us hasten to clothe ourselves in it anew by a true 
conversion. Let us embrace with courage the practice 
of penance — of that second baptism which, through the 
mercy of God, restores us to the state wherein the 
former had placed us. 

Let us be resigned in our trials, whatsoever they be. 
Let us remember Jesus suffering, and imitate him. We 
have contemplated him, enduring without a word, with- 
out uttering a complaint, the most intolerable pains and 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 251 

the most humiliating opprobrium : oh ! what a condemna- 
tion of our impatience and our delicacy ! 

Let us be fond of religious poverty, and cherish it 
faithfully. Let us think often that Jesus allowed him- 
self to be stripped of his clothes, in order to merit for 
those whom he calls to his service the grace to renounce 
entirely all earthly goods, to put on and worthily wear 
his livery, to observe in its full extent that precept of 
St. Paul : " Put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ."* 

Let us also think that it is an inevitable necessity 
that every man should be stripped, and stripped of all, 
whether involuntarily, by the accidents of life and by 
death ; or voluntarily, by penance and mortification. Let 
us consider what precious advantages the second of 
these despoilments procures, and practise it with gener- 
osity ; let us labor unceasingly to strip ourselves of our 
ourselves, of our passions, our self-love, that we may be 
the imitators of Jesus Christ, who is our model on earth, 
as he shall be our reward in heaven. 

Divine Jesus! spotless Lamb! who, to expiate the 
misfortune I have had in depriving myself of grace, 
subjected thyself to so many sorrows and humiliations, 
how can I thank thine infinite generosity 1 This wiir 
be by trying to become like unto thee, in stripping myself 
entirely of myself, especially of my pride and my 
sensuality ; it will be by practising humility and morti- 
fication ; it will be by taking care never more to lose 
the precious gift of innocence which thou hast bestowed 
upon me. 

Mary ! my Mother ! help inc to preserve that 
* Rom., xiii. 14. 



252 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

sacred robe wherewith I must be covered to be received 
into heaven ; that nuptial garment wherewith I must be 
adorned to be admitted to the hall of the eternal ban- 
quet ; to have a place at the wedding feast of the Lamb, 
who, to merit for me that signal favor, suffered unheard- 
of pains and inconceivable humiliation ! 

Beseech him, by those pains and by that humiliation, 
to grant me perseverance in the state of grace, to the end 
that my soul may be ever fair in thy sight, and that it 
may be admitted, immediately after my death, to enjoy 
his presence, and to glorify him with thee in the 
heavenly home. 

(See Resumes, page 402.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 253 

FORTY-THIRD MEDITATION. 
THE CRUCIFIXION. 



; They crucified him.'" — St. Luke, xxiii. 33. 



CONSIDERATION. 

For more than four thousand years, divine justice 
awaited on Calvary the solemn expiation : that hour is 
come at last, the Victim is ready, the altar is prepared, 
the sacrifice is about to be accomplished. 

Jesus, stripped of his garments, raises his eyes to 
heaven ; he then casts them on the cross beside him, 
and lays himself down on that bed of pain and igno- 
miny, and present? his hands and his feet to the 
executioners who are going to pierce them. 

Ah ! come now, Christian souls, to your beloved 
Lord! come and contemplate that august Victim in this 
moment of supreme torture ; come and consider his 
immolation, which took place on a mountain so that all 
men might witness it ; assist at the most dismal specta- 
cle that ever was on earth ; place yourselves in the 
front rank and look closely at that heart-rending sight. 
Behold ! the executioners pitilessly seize the right hand, 
put it roughly on the wood of the cross, and one of them 
pierces it with a large nail which he drives in with 
repeated blows ! 

Ah ! who can understand what our divine Savior 



25-i MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

feels at this moment ! The very thought of such suffer- 
ing makes one shudder with horror ; the imagination 
shrinks with terror from such a picture. . . 

But no, let us turn away neither our imagination nor 
our thoughts ; let us, on the contrary, consider with 
pity and with attention that horribly mangled hand 
fastened to the cross, those bent fingers, those broken 
nerves, that blood that spouts from the torn veins, that con- 
tracting arm, that stiffening body, that head restless in 
the fire of pain ! Let us read on the face of our blessed 
Savior, and in his tearful eyes, what he endures in his 
immaculate flesh, to expiate the sins we have committed 
in our guilty flesh. 

And yet this is not all that Jesus has resigned him- 
self to suffer on this occasion ; it even seems that this 
is but the beginning. The bloody execution continues : 
the executioners seize the left arm of the Victim which 
abandons itself to their cruelty : they pull it violently 
to bring the hand to the place where it is to be fixed, 
and by that tension, the very idea of which makes one 
shudder, they enlarge the wound in the right hand, 
dislocate the bones, cause Jesus unutterable sufferings ; 
then they nail the left hand as they did the right. 

And thus it is, O Lord! that those divine. hands are 
treated which had wrought so many prodigies — those 
hands that made heaven and earth. . . . And it is by 
man, who is their work and for whom those miracles 
were- wrought, that they are mangled, pierced, and 
fastened to the cross ; and that near Jerusalem, amongst 
that people and by that people whose conductor thou hast 
been, who had received from thee innumerable benefits. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. ZOO 

disorder ! O ingratitude ! more sensible to thy soul 
than even the pain thou sufferest in thy divine body. 

Meanwhile the executioners seize the feet of Jesus — 
those feet so beautiful, as the prophet says,* and which 
had brought peace — those feet on whose traces so many 
unfortunates had crowded — those feet which were so 
often tired in going to sinners and giving consolation 
to those who suffered. 

Yes ; the executioners seize them, they pull them 
violently, and thus disjoint the bones that were not so 
already ; and taking an enormous nail, they drive it 
through the two feet, and for the third time they strike 
repeatedly. 

Hearken, Christian souls ! hearken to those dismal 
strokes, heard distinctly by the noAV silent crowd — those 
strokes heard by the Blessed Virgin Mary, and sound- 
ing so sorrowfully in the heart of her who was his 
her mother. Ah ! weep with her, weep for the sorrow 
wherewith she is penetrated, and also weep for your- 
selves, weep for sin which is the cause of what Jesus 
and Mary endure on Calvary. 

The Victim is nailed on the wood of his immolation ; 
at this moment is literally accomplished what our divine 
Savior had foretold by the mouth of David : " They 
have pierced my hands and my feet ; they have 
numbered all my bones."t 

O Jesus, adorable Master ! deign, we beseech thee, to 

teach us why thou wouldst suffer such cruel torment. 

Ah ! it is that thou art the expiatory victim of all our 

sins, and that those sins are alas ! innumerable. At 

* Isa., Hi. 7. * Ps., xxi. 17, 18. 



256 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

this moment, thy feet are pierced because of our back- 
slidings from the way of virtue. At this moment, thy 
hands are pierced because of the sins of action which 
men have committed. 

Oh ! how great the number is ! how they are multi- 
plied from the day when Eve stretched out a guilty 
hand to the tree whereon was the forbidden fruit, to 
that hour of darkness when the executioners laid their 
sacrilegious hands on thy sacred body ! How numerous 
they will be again from that hour till the moment when 
Antichrist shall insolently raise his hand against heaven ! 
Ah ! I understand, Lord, that it is in thy hands thou 
didst endure thy greatest exterior sufferings ! 

APPLICATION. 

In union with Mary on Calvary, let us compassionate 
the sufferings of Jesus ; let the blows that crush that 
divine Victim find an echo in our heart ... It is for 
us he suffers : let us then suffer with him. 

Let us bless him, sacrificing himself for our salvation. 
With all the saints, let us magnify his love, which led 
him to substitute himself in our place, to be bruised by 
divine justice exasperated by our sins. 

Remembering the pains of his crucifixion, let us 
deplore our wanderings from the way of virtue, and all 
the sins we have committed in the use of our hands. 
Ah ! let us never forget how much he suffered to 
expiate them. 

Let us also think that Jesus crucified is the model to 
whom we must be conformable. Nevertheless, let that 
thought not frighten us : our adorable Master does not 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 257 

call us to suffer torments like those he suffered ; and, 
besides, if he did call us to it, he would be himself our 
strength, and would render us superior to our ills. But 
there is a cross to which we must be fastened, and on 
which we must place ourselves, and subdue ourselves by 
the desire of becoming like unto him. Yes, for us 
Religious, our cross is the accomplishment of our holy 
Rules ; and the nails that fasten us to that cross, are our 
obedience, our gratitude and love for Jesus ; also the 
holy engagements that we have contracted, to make 
sure of our perseverance in his service. 

Let us be faithful to those engagements, let us live 
as true Religious : by that means, we shall render our- 
selves conformable to the divine model who showed 
himself to us on the mountain of Calvary, and we shall 
secure our rights to the celestial heritage which he 
merited for us by his sufferings and death. 

Let the contemplation of the crucifixion of Jesus 
encourage us also in our sickness ; let us then cast our 
eyes on that divine Savior fastened to the cross, and 
think that the cross he wills for us, is the bed of pain 
to which avc are confined. Let us appreciate as a real 
advantage this point of resemblance to him, and unite 
our sufferings with his. 

Let us adore him with the most affectionate piety on 
the cross to which he is fastened. Let us adore the 
wounds of his hands and feet, and ask of him the grace 
to manifest them in ourselves by the practice of penance 
and mortification. 



l'-)8 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

PRAYER. 

Behold me, O Jesus ! near thy cross, weeping at the 
remembrance of thy sorrows and at the thought of my 
sins which have caused them. Oh ! how cruel I have 
been to thee ! Nevertheless, permit me, my generous 
Redeemer ! to open my heart to the hope of pardon ; for 
the wounds of thy hands and feet, which so eloquently 
reproach me with my crimes, are also the motive of my 
confidence : I know that by them thou hast expiated 
for me, and I may regard them as a writing which thou 
thyself didst trace with thy blood, and which gives me 
a right to thy mercy. I beseech thee, then, by thy 
divine Avounds, and also by the sorrows of thy blessed 
Mother, to forget all my sins, and to give me courage to 
be an obedient religious, faithful to my rule, crucified 
to the world, having in my heart only the desire of 
pleasing thee and of persevering in thy holy service. 

(See Rk6Umes, page 403.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 259 

FORTY-FOURTH MEDITATION. 
JESUS RAISED ON THE CROSS. 



"As Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the Son 
of Man be lifted up." — St. John, iii. 14. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us contemplate, with all the devotion of which 
our heart is capable, our Divine Savior nailed to the 
cross, and suffering, in that state, the most cruel pains ; 
let us read on his contracted features the violence of 
the torment he endures ; let us hear his prolonged groans ; 
let us fix our eyes on his pierced hands and feet, on the 
blood which flows from them as from four inexhaustible 
springs. Ah ! let us comprehend from that sight how 
much he loved us and how much our redemption costs 
him. . . 

And yet, how far he still is from having suffered all 
he has resigned himself to suffer for our salvation ! 

He is fastened to the cross ; but the cross must be 
placed standing, for the altar of the great sacrifice must, 
be raised up, and present to the world's view the Lamb 
immolating himself for its salvation — he who is the 
mediator between God and man must be placed between 
heaven and earth — he who is the light of nations must 
be exposed to the view of all nations — that Son of man 
who from the height of his gibbet shall draw all things 



200 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

to himself, must be lifted up. Ah ! he must also ex- 
piate, by that painful and ignominious exposure, the sins 
of pride by which we have sought to raise ourselves 
and make ourselves conspicuous before men. Yes, the 
cross must be placed standing ; but alas ! what suffer- 
ings for Jesus ! 

Let us assist in thought at that elevation of the 
august Victim — the cross is uplifted from the earth — its 
foot is placed against a rock — it is gradually raised by 
means of cords and ladders — then when it is standing, it 
is slipped along and let fall with all its weight into the 
hole prepared to receive it. 

Oh ! who can tell what Jesus feels from this horrible 
shock ! what a tearing of his pierced hands ! what a 
counter-shock in the wounds of his feet ! Ah ! the 
imagination is lost, the eye of the soul refuses to fathom 
that abyss of torture. Never was seen sight so heart- 
rending ; never did the sun shine on such a scene : 
hence he veils his light in horror ! 

And when I reflect that lie who suffers thus is my 
beloved Master, my God, my Father, my Jesus, that he 
suffers for me and on my account. No ! I know not on 
what sentiment to pause : I am at once agitated by con- 
fusion, sorrow for my faults, love, and gratitude ; all urge 
me to cast myself at the foot of that cross, which now 
stands on Calvary, and there pour forth my tears ! . . . 

But in order that the contemplation of this mystery 
of inconceivable torment may produce in us fruits of 
salvation, let lis also pause on the other reflections to 
which it gives birth. 

This elevation of Jesus on the cross had been fore- 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 261 

told, for th» prophets had seen " the root of Jesse stand 
for an ensign of the people ;"* and above all it had been 
prefigured by the serpent which Moses raised in the 
flesert, as Jesus himself tells us in these words : " As 
Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the 
Son of Man be lifted up."t 

This elevation of the cross takes place on a mountain, 
in the middle of the day, on the eve of the most solemn 
Sabbath, before people of all nations, and that, to show 
that all men who have all been bitten by the infernal 
serpent, are called to cast on the divine Crucified the 
look of faith that will heal the wounds of the soul. Ah ! 
if the sight of the. brazen serpent, which was only a 
figure, was, nevertheless, so efficacious in curing the 
Israelites of the bite of the fiery serpents, how much 
more so will be the contemplation of Jesus on the cross 
in delivering us from the injury the devil has done us ! 

That divine Savior, uplifted on the tree of ignominy, 
expiates our pride, whereby we would have raised our- 
selves above our brethren ; and teaches us at the same 
time in what consists the true elevation, that which is 
allowable, that to which we should even aspire — we 
Christians, who have in our souls the holy ambition of 
resembling our Savior. 

Yes, it is by the cross that man is truly elevated ; it 
is on the cross that he shows himself truly great, and it 
is only when he has been exposed thereon to the eyes 
of all, that he becomes worthy of esteem. Let us desire 
to !'(■ elevated, but elevated on the cross in union with 
our adorable Master. 

* [sa., xi. 10. f St. John, iii. 14. 



262 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

Ah ! we know well that at that thought nature 
revolts ; but Jesus elevated on the cross, merited for us 
the grace of prevailing over nature. He calls us to go 
upon the cross with him ; he will have us united with* 
him, in order that in this union we may be exposed to 
view and made, as St. Paul says, " a spectacle to the 
world."* 

And not only does he call us, Religious, to go up 
with him on his dolorous cross, but he calls all men 
thither, for he says : "And I, if I be lifted up from the 
earth, will draw all things to myself. "t 

And it is to repeat to all generations this necessity of 
raising ourselves, by the Christ, with Jesus Christ, that 
the mystery of the elevation of Jesus on the cross is 
constantly recalled to Christians by the images of the 
crucifix, which the Church everywhere exhibits before 
our eyes. Furthermore, that elevation is mysteriously 
continued in the holy sacrifice of the mass : three times 
does the priest elevate the holy Victim to present it to 
the adoration of the faithful, and thus recall the eleva- 
tion of the same Victim on Calvary. 

APPLICATION. 

Let us often cast our eyes upon Jesus on the cross, 
and think of what he suffers and why he suffers. Let 
us compassionate his pains, and remembering that our 
sins have caused them, penetrate ourselves with senti- 
ments of the most bitter repentance. 

Let us be humble, modest, resigned : let us desire 
for ourselves no other elevation than that of the cross. 
* 1 Cor., iv. 9. t St. John, xii. 32. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 263 

Let us say with St. Paul : " God forbid that I should 
glory, but in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ."* 

Let us frequently recall to our mind the elevation of 
Jesus on the cross, but particularly at the moment when 
the priest elevates the consecrated host and chalice. 

Let devotion to the cross be ever dear to us. And, 
indeed, how could it be otherwise ? The crucifix is the 
most eloquent of books ; it speaks to the senses, the 
mind, the heart ; no language is so touching. It says 
all, it teaches all, it answers to all. It consoles in the 
bitterest troubles : it animates to the greatest efforts of 
virtue ; it induces charity, patience, forgiveness of 
injuries, love of enemies. 

Let us bear it constantly about us, let us place it in 
every apartment of our houses, let us salute it with the 
most religious respect when we .meet it in town or 
country. 

Let us form our pupils to devotion to the crucifix : 
let us teach them to read that book, which speaks so 
eloquently of the love of Jesus for us, and the price at 
which he estimated our soul. Let us persuade them to have 
on them and near their bed that ever blessed image, 
which we can never sufficiently venerate. 

May the sight of the crucifix excite in us the most 
lively confidence, and inspire us with all the love where- 
with our hearts ought to be inflamed for Jesus. 

O crucifix ! sweet image of my Savior ! O book of 

the Christian ! thou shalt ever be dear to me ; I shall ever 

have thee about me, and have thee near my bed. Often, 

yes, very often, I will kiss thee with love and respect ; and 

* Gal., vi. 14. 



264 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

when the final moment comes, it is to thee that I shall 
give up my last sigh, it is in thee that my soul shall find 
strength by which to escape the devil, and to raise itself 
up to that abode where my Savior is, and whither he 
draws all those Avho are his. 

PRAYER. 
O Jesus ! who wouldst be exposed to the view of all 
nations, as the sign of hope, permit me to hope in thee ! 
I contemplate thee on the cross, I recall all the pains 
thou didst there endure; remembering also that thou 
didst endure them for my salvation, I open my heart to 
confidence. Thou didst say that when thou wert up- 
lifted from the earth, thou wouldst draw all things to 
thyself: ah ! thou wilt save me, O generous Redeemer ! 
No, thou wilt not permit so many toils and sufferings to 
be lost for a soul which aspires to go to thee, to be 
united with thee here below in thy sufferings and thy 
crucifixion, that it may be united with thee in heaven 
in thine infinite glory. 

(See Resumes, page 403.) 



OF. OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 265 

FORTY-FIFTH MEDITATION. 
JESUS ON THE CROSS. 



" The root of Jesse, who standeth for an ensign of the people. 
— Isa., xi. 10. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us go in spirit to Calvary, let us place ourselves 
before the cross, and contemplate the adorable Victim 
of our redemption on the altar of sacrifice. 

What a picture is presented to our eyes ! To what a 
state ourJbeloved Savior is reduced, and what sufferings 
he endures in his body and in his soul ! 

Let us behold him hanging between heaven and 
earth, fastened by enormous nails to an infamous gibbet, 
his body naked, mangled, covered with wounds, or 
rather, all one wound, from head to foot. Let us behold 
his immaculate flesh cruelly torn, his bones disjointed 
and laid bare, so that, according to the expression of 
the prophet, they may be " numbered."* Let us 
behold his august head crowned with thorns, his face 
streaked with the blood which, streaming from his brow, 
mingles with his sweat and his tears ; let vis behold his 
languid eyes, his contracted lips, his inflamed mouth 
giving utterance to sighs and groans that might soften 
the hardest heart. . . 

* Pb., xxi. 18.. 
12 



266 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

Let us consider, with the liveliest compassion, his 
pierced hands and feet, and the fearful wounds which 
the nails have made — wounds from which all his blood 
flows drop by drop, and which, like those of the crown 
of thorns, are the ceaseless cause of inconceivable 
torture to him. If he would rest on his feet, he has, 
alas ! no other support than the iron that is through 
them ; if he would rest on his hands, he enlarges the 
wounds thereof, and produces the most painful tension 
in his arms ; moreover, his chest heaves, and his 
breathing becomes more and more difficult ; if he cast 
down his head, he adds to the weight of his body and 
tears his hands already torn ; if he lift it up, he rests 
the crown of thorns against the wood of the cross, and 
the thorns are driven farther in. 

Thus there is nothing for him but pain, without any 
possible alleviation ! Great God ! what a situation ! 
And it is our beloved Jesus, it is our adorable Savior 
who has vouchsafed to reduce himself to it for our sake ! 

But who could conceive what he suffers in his soul ! 
They have crucified two thieves, one on his right and the 
other on his left, in order to point him out as a notorious 
malefactor ; and as he had foretold by himself and by 
Isaiah, he is " reputed with the wicked ! "* . . .0 God ! 
to what fellowship is he reduced who is the figure of thy 
substance, and reigneth with thee in the same unity of 
nature ! Ah ! what shame for him ! what ignominy ! 
and also what destitution, and what outrage ! 

When a man is about to enter into his agony, every 
one crowds around him; he receives all possible care 
* Isa., liii. 12; St. Mark, xv. 28. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 267 

and attention : lie hears words of comfort and encourage- 
ment to sustain him in those trying moments, every one 
is eager to show that they love him, and regret him ; 
•but for Jesus there is no such thing, except it be from 
his blessed Mother, St. John, and the holy women, whose 
presence is, in one respect, a subject of great pain to 
him. Yes ! all that surrounds him contributes to excite 
in his mind the most sorrowful thoughts, and to break 
his heart with anguish : he suffers, through compassion, 
all that is suffered by Mary, the beloved disciple, and 
the holy women ; he sees his enemies regarding him 
with insolent contempt, cm-sing him and wagging their 
heads, making game of the tortures he endures ; he hears 
what is said around the cross, and he hears only the most 
cruel mockery and the grossest insults, abusive epithets, 
blasphemy, and loud bursts of derisive laughter, mingling 
with the groans of his divine Mother. . . . 

Into what an ocean of bitterness he is plunged ! And 
yet this is not all ! Jesus is not limited to the present 
moment, he beholds the future till the end of ages ; and, 
of the almost infinite number of men who are yet to be 
born, he perceives but a very small number who will 
really be his friends : all the others present themselves 
to his mind as having inherited the hatred of the Jews 
for his person, his doctrine, and his Church. 

He sees them refusing to apply to themselves the 
merits of his sacrifice, and running to their eternal ruin, 
notwithstanding all he does to save them ; he sees them 
trampling, with sacrilegious indifference, on the blood 
he sheds in torrents for them ; he sees them transmit- 
ting from generation to generation a fatal inheritance of 



268 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

vice and error, denying the truths he has taught, despis- 
ing his morality, mocking his cross, continuing, in regard 
to the Church, his mystic body, the outrages wherewith 
the princes of the synagogue at this moment overwhelm 
himself. 

How great, then, were the pains of his soul ! How 
his divine heart was bruised by affliction, during his 
agony on the cross ! 

APPLICATION. 

The picture of the sufferings of Jesus penetrates us 
to the depth of our soul. Ah ! let us think that he 
endures them for love of us miserable sinners, whose 
hearts he wishes to gain, and for whom he substituted 
himself before the justice of his Father ; let us think that 
he endures them in order to induce us to hate and avoid 
sin, which caused them, and to teach us patience, resig- 
nation, courage in trials. 

Let us understand what duties result to us from them, 
and accomplish them cheerfully and faithfully. 

Let us love Jesus who loved us so as to sacrifice 
himself for our salvation ; and let us love him with all 
our heart. Let us prove it by giving him our fondest 
affection and a perfect devotion to his service. 

Let us often contemplate him immolating himself on 
the cross : let us correspond with the intention of the 
Church who wishes the crucifix to be the most precious 
ornament of our dwellings, that we may carry it con- 
stantly about us, that it may even be placed along the 
streets and roads, so that we may unceasingly think of 
the adorable Victim of our redemption. 



OF OITR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 2.G9 

Let the sight of Jesus on the cross inspire us with a 
true repentance, remembering that it is on account of 
our sins that the God of love suffers and dies. Let us weep 
for the misfortune we have had in committing them, and 
mingle our tears with the blood he sheds to expiate 
them. 

Let the sight of Jesus on the cross make us likewise 
understand the cost of grace ; let it dispose us to set 
an infinite value on that treasure, for the purchase of 
which the Son of God suffered infinite pains, and which 
he valued more than his very life. 

Let it inspire us with patience in the ills and adversi- 
ties of life : for what are our troubles compared to those 
of Jesus ? Ah ! could we still refuse to accept them, 
after having considered him suffering every pain and 
every sorrow 1 

But no ; it is not enough to excite ourselves to 
patience : let us bear in mind that Jesus on the cross is 
the model to which all the elect must be conformable. 

Yes, Christian souls, this is the heavenly spouse 
whom you must resemble ! raise yourselves, then, by 
grace above your nature ; and, notwithstanding your 
repugnance, love, desire, and seek for the pains and 
trials of life, because it is by them especially that you 
will succeed in reproducing in yourselves the linea- 
ments of your beloved Savior, and manifest your love 
for him. 

PRAYER. 

Jesus, divine Crucified ! how great have been thy 
sorrows, and how generous thy love for us ! Thy hands, 



270 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

thy feet, thine august head, or rather, all in thee and 
about thee, tells me what thou didst deign to suffer for 
me. 

Why, then, Jesus! hast thou loved me to such an 
excess ? What didst thou see in me that induced thee 
so to sacrifice thyself, without pity either for thyself or 
thy blessed Mother f Ah ! thou answerest me from 
thy cross, that thou saw what I might become by 
profiting of the graces thou didst merit for me by thy 
sufferings. 

Give me, O Lord ! I beseech thee, the courage, the 
generosity, the strength of mind, necessary to correspond 
with all those thou offerest to me. 

At this moment thou dost offer me the grace of sor- 
row for my sins ; may I weep for them, then, and may 
my tears, like those which Magdalen poured forth at 
the foot of the cross, mingle with thy blood and obtain 
pardon for me! Thou dost offer the grace of thy divine 
love ; grant, then, that I may love thee, O my good 
Master ! Thou didst say that when thou wert lifted 
up from earth, thou wouldst draw all things to thy- 
self; draw me, then, to thyself, now that thou art on 
the cross, and grant that I may be for ever united to 
thee ! 

(See Resumes, page 404.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 271 

FORTY-SIXTH MEDITATION 
JESUS PRAYS FOR HIS ENEMIES. 



"Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. 
St. Luke, xxiii. 34. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Contemplate, Christian souls, your Grod fastened to 
the cross, lifted up between heaven and earth, and 
teaching men by his example the sublime precept of 
the forgiveness of injuries and the love of enemies — a 
precept before unknown, and which he had already 
taught by these words : "Love your enemies, do good 
to them that hate you, pray for them that persecute 
and calumniate you."* 

At this moment his enemies surround him like furious 
bulls, f delighting in outraging him ; their every word 
speaks hatred and contempt ; the soldiers insult him 
and divide his garments amongst them ; the mob, 
excited by the synagogue, blaspheme him ; the chief 
priests, the doctors of the law, the ancients of the 
people, are not ashamed to mingle with the multitude, 
and to mock him in the most cruel and humiliating 
manner; the passers-by wag their heads and heap 
curses upon him, and all call upon him to come down 
from the cross if he be the Son of God, or if it be true 
* St. Matt,, v. 44. f Ps., xxi. 13. 



272 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

that God protects him — all dare to say that he is not 
Christ, since he answers not their sacrilegious challenge 
by his own deliverance. 

There is no longer, for him, either pity or humanity 
in hearts ; he hears only a unanimous concert. of mock- 
ery, reproach, insult, blasphemy. 

How many motives has he not, then, to draw down 
signal vengeance on his enemies ! His dignity outraged ; 
God his Father offended, and offended by deicide ; all 
justice set at nought, insults without number heaped on 
an innocent person who suffers, without a word, the 
torments of a most cruel punishment — does not all this 
induce him to cry out, as did the high priest Zachary, 
immolated between the altar and the temple : " The 
Lord see and requite it ? "* 

But he will not do it. Heeding only his infinite 
goodness, he will call down on his enemies only 
heavenly graces. His divine mouth opens, and it 
utters only those sublime and most wonderful words : 
" Father, forgive them, for they know not what they 
do!" 

What ! Lord, is this what thy heart inspires in such 
circumstances ? They curse thee, and thou answerest 
with blessings ; they calumniate thee, and thou offerest 
excuses for thy calumniators ; they put thee to the 
most infamous death, and, when about to undergo it, 
thou prayest for thy persecutors and thine executioners ! 
No, Lord ! it is not thus that man could act : thou art 
my God, and I adore thee. Hadst thou spoken but 
these words, they would suffice to establish thy divinity. 
* 2 Paral., xxiv. 22. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 273 

Oh ! help me to understand their meaning well during 
this meditation, in order that I may enter into the spirit 
of the mystery I am contemplating, and that I may 
learn to know well the perfections of thy sacred heart. 

Jesus had not broken silence whilst they accused and 
condemned, even whilst they crucified him : he thus 
acquitted himself in a sublime manner of his august 
character of Victim, and remained dumb as a lamb 
before his shearer;* but being at once the Victim and 
the Priest of his Sacrifice, he had to act as a priest, that 
is to say, pray and instruct. Hence he speaks, now that 
he is standing on the cross and in the attitude of a 
priest at the altar, and his first word is at once the most 
admirable and the most efficacious prayer, and the most 
salutary lesson. Forgetting that it is by his enemies 
he suffers, he only remembers that it is for them 
"Father," said he, "forgive them, for they know not 
what they do." 

How eloquent is that supplication, and how calculated 
to obtain its object ! 

Jesus says, "my Father," and not "my Grod," in 
order to soften the more the heart of him whom he 
addresses : he asks pardon for his enemies in a precise, 
definitive manner — Forgive them — but he alludes 
only in a vague way to the crime for which he asks 
pardon, and even without naming it, he hastens to 
excuse it on the score of ignorance in those by whom it 
is committed. 

Oh ! how great, how charitable, how generous is the 
Pontiff we have with God ! that Priest of the new law, 
* Isa., liii. 7. 



274 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

who, entirely forgetting himself, thinks only of us on 
the altar of sacrifice ! 

It was not only when on the cross that Jesus solicited 
our pardon ; no, as eternal priest, he unceasingly 
addresses his Father, asking pardon for sinners. Always, 
and especially when he immolates himself in the holy 
sacrifice of the mass, he repeats that prayer, " Father, 
forgive them ;" and he will repeat it so long as pardon 
may come from heaven to earth. 

But let us consider some other points under which 
the charity of Jesus is revealed, in that prayer which 
he makes as priest, and which is the object of our 
meditation. 

Whilst being cruelly outraged, he thinks not of him- 
self, but of the outrage offered to God his Father, and 
the misfortune of those who are its authors ; what 
afflicts him is the sin of deicide the enormity of which 
he comprehends, and the curses drawn down on their 
own head by those who commit the crime. There is 
in him no desire of revenge, no hatred, no dislike : his 
heart is only accessible to the feeling of ardent love for 
his enemies, and that at the very moment when the 
latter give themselves up to the dictates of the greatest 
and most unjust hatred. He asks pardon for them 
through the very blood he sheds in the very torment 
they make him undergo, and he asks it with " prayers 
and supplication, with a strong cry and tears."* 

goodness ! O generosity ! O infinite charity ! 



* Heb., v. 7. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 275 



APPLICATION. 

Let us often remember Jesus crucified, and praying 
for his executioners, and let us regulate our conduct on 
that of our adorable Master. 

Could it be that after such an example, our heart 
would feel — I do not say hatred, or desire of revenge — 
but even the slightest rancor or resentment ? Ah ! if so, 
could we still dare to call ourselves disciples of Jesus 
Christ? . . . 

And what pretence could our self-love offer to justify 
any resentment ? What are we, compared with the 
Son of God, whom we have contemplated forgiving 
those who crucified him ? What injury is done to us, 
in comparison with the outrages he underwent, and the 
ignominious death he suffered 1 

Nature inclines us to exaggerate the wrongs done us 
by our neighbor : well ! let us ask grace of Jesus on the 
cross to triumph over nature ; and let us animate ourselves, 
under all circumstances and towards all persons whatever, 
with sentiments of the most generous charity. If any 
one offend us, let us forgive him with all our heart ; and if 
we cannot excuse the action, let us at least excuse the 
intention. 

Yes, let us forgive all and always. Let us do more ; 

erraces 



let us pray God to forgive and enrich with his 

every person against whom we feel any resentment, 

envy, or dislike. 

Let us have a firm hope of being ourselves forgiven, 
since we know that Jesus on the cross prayed for us, 
and that God heard his prayer ; but let us not forget 



276 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

that the pardon he merited for us and asked, can only 
be granted to hearts that are contrite and merciful 
towards the neighbor. 

PRAYER. 

Jesus ! who, from the height of the cross dost pray 
for thine enemies, grant us to participate in thy good- 
ness, thy charity : we are thy disciples — grant, then, 
that we may be really thine imitators ! 

Take from our hearts, Jesus ! all suspicion, indig- 
nation, anger, and contention, and whatever else may 
wound charity and lessen brotherly love,* to the end 
that we may repeat with confidence the prayer which 
thou hast taught us : "Forgive us, as we forgive."! 

(See Resumes, page 404.) 



Imit., book iv., ch. ix. 6. t St. Matt,, vi. 12. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 277 

FORTY-SEYENTH MEDITATION. 
JESUS PROMISES HEAVEK TO THE GOOD THIEF. 



This day thou shalt be with me in paradise." — 
St. Luke, xxiii. 43. 



CONSIDERATION. 

The holy Gospel, speaking of persons who outrage 
Jesus fastened to the cross, mentions the thieves who 
were crucified with him, and records the words of one 
of them : " If thou be Christ," said he, '.' save thyself, 
and us."* 

Thus a vile wretch, a felon, repeats the insults of the 
Jewish priests, and calls on Jesus to show his divinity 
by coming down from the cross. This unhappy man, 
instead of preparing for death, outrages him who, in 
some moments, is to judge him and pass sentence upon 
him for all eternity. . . . 

Meanwhile the other thief is suddenly enlightened by 
a celestial light ; and, docile to the grace given him 
through the merits of the divine blood which flows near 
him, he recognizes in Christ his Lord and his God. So, 
immediately animating himself with zeal for the glory 
of our divine Savior, he rebukes his companion and re- 
proaches him with the injustice of his outrages : u Neither 
dost thou fear God, seeing thou art under the same 
* St. Luke, xxiii. 39. 



278 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

condemnation. And we, indeed, justly ; for we receive 
the due reward of our deeds : but this man hath done 
no evil." Then turning, as much as lie possibly could, 
towards Jesus : " Lord," said he, " remember me, when 
thou shalt come into thy kingdom."* 

admirable words ! prodigy of grace ! What ! is 
that the villain who was himself but now insulting the 
divine Victim ? Why, his language shows that he has 
in him all the virtues that make holy penitents : and, 
in fact, he has the fear of God, which is the beginning 
of wisdom, t and he seeks to inspire it in his companion : 
" Neither dost thou fear God." He has the zeal of an 
apostle, and his zeal proves the sincerity of his con- 
version ; he is humble and contrite, loudly confessing his 
sins and accepting, in expiation, the torments he endures 
on the cross ; he is full of hope, and perfectly resigned 
to the will of God. 

What is especially admirable in him, is the faith which 
he professes openly and solemnly : how sublime it is ! 
how lofty ! how well it shows the prodigious, the supreme, 
efficacy of grace ! 

And, in reality, what does he behold externally in 
Jesus ? A man fastened like himself to an ignominious 
gibbet, outraged, covered with shame and opprobrium, 
naked, crowned with thorns, suffering the greatest 
exhaustion, about to die the death of a felon ; and yet 
in that man he recognizes Christ, the Son of the living 
God ; he venerates him as a King seated on a throne ; 
he adores him as though he contemplated him radiant 
with his divine splendor ! . . . 

* St, Luke, xxiii. 40-42. t Ps.. ex. 10. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 279 

Yes ! when the apostles, who had seen the dead come 
forth from the grave at the voice of Jesus, totter in their 
faith, a thief who sees him tortured with himself, con- 
fesses his divinity ; and that at the very moment when 
the chief priests and the ancients of the people blas- 
pheme against that adorable Savior, and insult him as 
though he had been the most wicked of men ! 

Let us admire this miracle of his infinite goodness. 
At this moment when he is the object of the sacri- 
legious insults of his enemies, he forgets himself to 
attend to the salvation of souls ; he offers one of the 
crucified thieves a powerful grace to which the 
latter hastens to correspond. 

He is not ashamed to speak to a criminal justly con- 
demned to capital punishment, and to tell him with 
surprising amiability : " This day thou shalt be with 
me in paradise;" I will have thee for my companion, 
my friend, with whom I shall enter heaven. What 
condescension ! what generosity ! The penitent thief 
asks only a remembrance, and behold, Jesus grants 
him, that very day, a throne in his kingdom, an infinite 
happiness. . . . 

happy thief ! bless in the highest heavens him who 
dealt mercifully with you, and with the holy penitents 
celebrate his infinite goodness and clemency. 

Alas ! the companion of your sins and of your torments 
does not imitate you ; he will not have the mercy which 
is offered to him likewise ; and, by his own fault, he is 
doomed to make manifest, in time and in eternity, the 
terrible justice exercised by the Supreme Judge on those 
who refuse to acknowledge him for the Supreme King. 



280 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

Yes, on the cross Jesus reveals himself as supreme 
King and full of goodness, giving an everlasting 
kingdom to a penitent thief,— but also as a dreadful 
Judge condemning him who persists in resistance to his 
grace. . . . And that judgment which he exercises 
on Calvary, he exercises still and will exercise till the 
last day ; every instant, he says to some penitent soul 
about to die: "This day thou shalt be with me in para- 
dise ; " and every instant he gives up, alas! to their 
reprobate sense, those who resist his final graces and so 
prefer death in sin to their conversion ! 

This judgment he will exercise on all men, when, 
seated on a throne of glory and having the good on his 
right and the wicked on his left, he shall say to the 
former: " Come, ye blessed of my Father, possess the 
kingdom prepared for you;"* and to the latter: 
"Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire."t 

APPLICATION. 
Two sentiments, of a very opposite nature, ought to 
be excited in us by the meditation we have been 
making — confidence and fear. 

Whatsoever may be a man's sins, he may always 
hope for mercy, and obtain it by a generous corre- 
spondence -with grace : though he had worn out Ins life 
in crime, and were on the point of appearing before his 
Judge, he may still say what the Church sings in the 
Office for the dead: "Thou, . . . by absolving of the 
thief, hast given me hope."} 

* St. Matt., xxv. 34. t /&"*-, 41. 

t Prose Dies ira. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 281 

And if it be so for even the most infamous sinners, 
what should be the confidence of a Beligious who, at the 
bottom of his heart, has always cherished the desire 
of going to God and promoting his glory ! 

Nevertheless, the subject on which we meditate is 
very proper to inspire us with a salutary fear : this 
example of a great sinner converted at death is, in fact, 
the only one of which mention is clearly made in the 
Holy Scripture. If, considering the great mercy shown 
to the good thief, our hearts are opened to a boundless 
hope, reflecting on the fate of the companion of his 
torment, they should be penetrated with fear : for he, 
too, was crucified with Jesus, the witness of his patience, 
included in his prayer, associated in his sacrifice, placed 
near Mary a short distance from the cross, perhaps 
even sprinkled with the blood of redemption ; and yet 
he becomes obdurate and is lost, notwithstanding the 
interior touches of grace and the rebuke of the penitent 
thief; and that on the very day when earth is recon- 
ciled with heaven, and divine grace flows in torrents. 

Yes, let us hope, since the good thief was converted 
at death ; but let us also fear, for, in the same circum- 
stances, the bad thief was lost ! 

Let us be docile to the salutary invitations of grace ; 
it never fails us, neither let us fail it. Let us practise as 
we ought, the virtues manifested in the penitent thief : 
fear of God, zeal, humility, contrition, hope, resigna- 
tion. . . . By this means we shall merit that Jesus 
may one day address to us, likewise, those words of 
supreme felicity : " This day thou shalt be with me in 
paradise." 



282 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

PRAYER. 

amiable Jesus, divine Crucified, cast a look of com- 
passion on ray terror-stricken soul ! Oh ! how I dread 
to become one day thine enemy, and, like the bad thief, 
to disown thee and die in sin ! Lord ! I beseech thee 
by thy cross, by thy blood, have mercy on me and 
inspire me with the sentiments whereby the good thief 
found favor in thy sight. I, too, O my generous 
Redeemer! entreat thee to ^member me in thy kingdom 
and call me to reign there with thee. 

1 ask it through the intercession of thy divine 
Mother, and in the name of the sufferings she endured 
at the foot of thy cross. 

(See Resumes, page 405.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 283 

FORTY-EIGHTH MEDITATION. 
JESUS GIVES US MARY FOR OUR MOTHER. 



Woman, behold thy sou." — St. John, xix. 26. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us contemplate our adorable Redeemer on the 
cross about to consummate his immolation. Let us adore 
him in union with Mary, the beloved disciple, and the 
holy women, who have followed him to Calvary, and 
stand as near him as the guards permit. Let us 
hear — reflecting on the circumstances in which he pro- 
nounces them — the new and mysterious words which he 
allows to escape his divine lips. 

He is on the cross, and stripped of all, possessing only 
a little blood which he yields drop by drop ; for, from the 
moment when, by anticipation, he gave himself to his 
disciples in instituting the sacrament of the Eucharist, 
he sacrificed all ; and the moment approaches when he 
will give up life itself. 

Mary is standing near the cross, contemplating her 
Divine Son a prey to every torture, regarding one by 
one the wounds wherewith he is covered, lending an 
ear to every sigh he heaves, feeling by compassion all 
his sufferings and humiliations, abiding in an ecstacy of 
deepest grief. She is crucified with her Son. What 
agony ! dying she lives, living she dies ! Yes, she dies, 



284 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

in her heart as a mother, a death more painful than 
natural death. 

At this moment, when the new Adam restores what 
the first destroyed, the new Eve repairs the mischief 
wrought by the first. Jesus associates with himself 
Mary, his mother; he makes her a participator in the infi- 
nite sufferings by which he satisfies for guilty humanity. 
With him she immolates herself, and immolates 
herself for us, thus contributing to the work of our sal- 
vation. 

O Mary ! who can comprehend thy desolation ! It is 
as u great as the sea,"* and high as the heavens. Ah ! 
it is indeed at this moment that thou couldst say : " 
all ye that pass by the way, attend, and see if there be 
any sorrow like to my sorrow ! "t 

With Mary there stands by the cross St. John, the 
beloved disciple, the virgin, the apostle of charity, 
the confidant of the heart of Jesus — he who, at 
supper, reclined on the breast of his adorable Master. 
He alone, of all the apostles, had ascended Calvary to 
share in the supreme sorrows of the divine Victim 
whom love sacrifices for us. 

Jesus, with a languid eye that is soon to be extin- 
guished in the shades of death, looks upon his blessed 
Mother and the beloved disciple ; and addressing Mary, 
he says, referring to St. John : " Woman, behold thy 
Son." Then, addressing St. John in reference to Mary, 
he says : " Behold thy Mother."! 

O words sublime in their simplicity ! what love they 
express ! what prodigies they work ! 
* Lament., ii. 13. t Ibid., i. 12. \ St. John, xix. 26, 27. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 285 

Jesus substitutes St. John in his place to take care of 
his divine Mother, to protect and assist her as St. 
Joseph had done. 

He rewards him for his charity, his purity, his fidelity, 
by giving him that which he leaves dearest in this 
world, — that which is the ark of the new covenant, the 
treasure of heaven, the Queen of angels. What an 
inheritance ! Oh ! what tenderness was in the heart of 
Jesus for that privileged disciple ! 

But what tenderness he has for us all, for it is to us 
all that he gives Mary as a mother! 

We were represented in the person of St. John. Jesus 
accomplishing the work of redemption, ceased not to 
have in view the humanity he came to ransom. In 
praying for his executioners, he prayed for all sinners ; 
in pardoning the good thief, he regarded in his mercy 
all true penitents ; so, in giving Mary to St. John 
to be his mother, he gives her to all the faithful. 

Yes, it is we who are in question. It is of us Jesus 
thinks on the cross, at this moment when he suffers his 
greatest torments, and when Mary suffers with him. 
He thinks of us to give us his only remaining good, his 
divine Mother. It is of each one of us that he speaks, 
saying : " Woman, behold thy son ! " 

Divine Savior, in what a sublime manner thou fulfill- 
est thy promise not to leave us orphans ! Thou remain- 
est with us in thy sacrament, O tenderest of Fathers, 
and thou givest us Mary for our mother ! What have 
we, then, to desire, and why should we not unceasingly 
exalt thy generous love ? 

Jesus said " Woman," and not " Mother," to remind 



28(5 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

lis that he addresses himself to that woman of whom the 
holy books speak,* and by whose co-operation Eve's 
transgression was to be repaired ; to announce more 
clearly that he acts then as God, and is about to pro- 
nounce a final sentence which he wishes to be fully 
accomplished ; to signify that there is question of a real 
substitution, and that Mary is, thenceforth, to place all 
her affection on those whom he gives her for children. 

Such is really the case ; the word of Jesus is a divine 
and all-powerful word, which works out what it signifies. 
Mary has no sooner heard it than she feels all the senti- 
ments of tenderness, kindness, love, belonging to a 
mother ; she feels her heart dilate so as to embrace all 
Christian generations in the same affection ; she feels 
that she is our mother, not only by appointment, but 
also by love and inclination. 

Behold her adopting us for her children, and saying 
to Jesus, by her dispositions, as she had said to the 
angel Gabriel : " Be it done unto me according to thy 
word."t 

St. John, acting in our name, acknowledges her for 
his mother, and Jesus seals with his blood the contract 
of our adoption, so glorious and so advantageous to us. 

APPLICATION. 

Jesus established his holy Mother as our mother ; 
what a motive for blessing him, for celebrating his 
tenderness to us ! A mother is given to us, and that 
mother is Mary ! 

* Gen., iii. 15. t St. Luke, i. 38. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 287 

Let us glory in our quality of Christians, by which we 
are made children of Mary ; what motives we have for 
doing so ! She that is our mother, is the Virgin the 
Mother of God, the Queen of heaven and earth, the 
treasurer of grace, the highest, the noblest, the most 
perfect, of mere creatures. 

Mary is our Mother. Let us love her, after God, 
with all the love of which we are capable, and show 
ourselves always her worthy children. Let her image, 
her name, her memory, be unceasingly before our 
mind. 

Let us seek only to please her, and, to that end, 
accomplish faithfully what she enjoins in those words : 
" Whatsoever my Son shall say to ye, do ye."* 

Let us often call to mind the circumstances under 
which our adoption as children of Mary took place ; and 
let the sorroAvs which that august Virgin then endured, 
be the foundation of our filial love and the support of 
our confidence. 

Mary loves us and desires our happiness ; and, on the 
other hand, she is all-powerful with her divine Son 
who, in establishing her as our Mother, established her 
as our protectress : let us count, then, on her assistance, 
and never cease to have recourse to it. 

As Religious, beloved disciples of the Savior, it 
is to us particularly that Mary was given for Mother. 
By the grace of our vocation, Jesus told us in a 
special manner, in reference to Mary : " Behold thy 
Mother." St. John's happiness is, therefore, ours 
likewise. 

* St. John, ii. 5. 



288 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

Ah ! let us comprehend it as he did, and be like him 
devoted to the glory of her who ought to be -the object 
of our tenderest affection, and whom we are so happy 
to call our good Mother. 

PRAYER. 

O Mary ! remember that I am the child of thy sor- 
rows from the day when Jesus, dying, revealed to us 
that thou art the Mother of all Christians. Oh ! permit 
me to pour forth my heart into thine, and to say, and 
say unceasingly : " Yes, I love thee, I honor thee, I 
bless thee, my good, my gracious, my tender Mother; 
permit that I may express to thee with affection, the 
tenderness, devotion, confidence, my soul feels for thee." 

Mary who art still the Mother of Jesus Christ, our 
God, and who hast all power over him, present to him 
our prayers and supplications ; tell him to hear us — we 
who are likewise thy children and his adopted brothers ! 
Obtain that we may profit by the great sacrifice of Calvary 
in which thou didst co-operate, so that, at the moment of 
our death, Jesus may say to us, pointing to thee : 
" Behold thy Mother ; " and that he may admit us to 
participate in thine ineffable joys. 

(See Retimes, page 405.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 289 

FORTY-NINTH MEDITATION. 
ABANDONMENT OF JESUS ON THE CROSS. 



"My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me 
St. Matt., xxvii. 46. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us adofe our Lord Jesus Christ suffering his 
greatest pains on the cross. Let us contemplate him in 
union with his divine but desolate Mother, standing 
near the altar whereon he sacrifices himself. Let us 
fix our eyes on his crown of thorns, on his pale brOw 
bedewed with the sweat of his last agony, on his face 
covered with blood and dust, on his livid lips, his failing 
tearful eyes, his heaving chest, the wounds with which 
his whole body is covered ; let us fix them particularly 
on these of his hands and feet. 

Let us think of what he suffers in his soul, at this 
moment when he is the object of all contempt, and when, 
as in his agony in the Garden of Olives, he represents 
to himself the great number of sinners who will trample 
on the blood of redemption. 

His enemies have still the same hatred for him, while 

he manifests in their regard only the most generous, the 

most heroic love. The waters of tribulation wherewith 

they have inundated him, have in no degree quenched the 

13 



290 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

fire of charity* which consumes his divine heart. He 
has still the same desire for their salvation. Hence, in 
order to bring them to reflect on the magnitude of the 
crime they are committing, and to lead them into the way 
of repentance, he so wills it that a convulsion of nature 
symbolizes the moral convulsion of which they are the 
authors ; and that even inanimate creatures testify their 
horror of the deicide which is about being consummated. 

Thick darkness overspreads the whole earth and 
wraps it, as it were, in a mantle of mourning ; the sun 
veils his splendor ; hearts are seized with fear ; the blas- 
phemous words of the Pharisees are succeeded by a terri- 
fied silence ; all the enemies of the Savior feel themselves 
under the dominion of a superior power which, by the 
voice of the elements, reproaches them with their 
crimes. 

But alas ! they do not enter into themselves, and 
they persist in their criminal dispositions. 

Oh ! What a subject of pain for Jesus ! There is 
nothing to console him ; there is no alleviation of 
his sufferings, or rather all combines to aggravate 
them. He is, in the most absolute sense, " the Man of 
Sorrows. w # According to the expression of Holy Writ, 
he has to tread alone the wine press \ of divine justice, 
to expiate our iniquities, the responsibility of which he 
has taken upon him before his Father; and it is on this 
account that he suffers the greatest, the most heart- 
rending pain, — that of abandonment on the part of his 
Father himself. Ah ! let us behold him casting a look 
heavenward expressing all the distress of his soul, and 

* Cant., viii. 7. t Tsa., liii. 3. \ Ibid., lxiii. ?>. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 291 

hear him saying : " My God, my God, why hast thou 
foraken me ? " 

What grief is manifested by these mysterious words, 
and what a lesson they contain ! Till then Jesus uttered 
no complaint. In allowing this one to escape him, he 
makes us understand that his sufferings go on increasing, 
that they are accumulating, being heaped upon him ; he 
reveals to us that the chalice he drains is more and 
more bitter, that the agony of Calvary is even more 
overwhelming than that of Gethsemane. 

By these words, he invites us to reflect on the cause 
of his sufferings: — "My God," he says, "why hast 
thou forsaken me 1 " But he had already said by 
David : " My iniquities are gone over my head ; and as a 
heavy burden are become heavy upon me."* Now, 
those sins are ours ; and so it is we who are the cause of 
his abandonment. • 

By offending God, we have deserved that he should 
depart from us, that he should leave us to our misery, to 
our weakness, to the fury of the enemies of our souls. 
Now God sees all unfaithful mankind in his Son who 
is clothed in the form of a sinner, and hence he appears 
to abandon him and to close his ears to his groans. 

Jesus suffers that abandonment, to merit for us that 
we may not be abandoned by divine justice to the pain of 
loss, so justly due to our sins ; and which is, of all others, 
the most rigorous, the most hopeless. Oh ! what grati- 
tude do we not owe to the generous Redeemer who 
suffered it in our place ! 

In crying out on the cross, " My God, my God, why 
* Ps., xxxvii. 5. 



292 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

hast thou forsaken me ? " — -Jesus reveals himself as 
the Messiah announced by the prophets, for these words 
are none other than the first of the psalm in which are 
best depicted the sorrows he was to endure, and in 
which he had traced, a thousand years before, the as- 
pect under which he presents himself at this very 
moment. 

" My God," he had said by the prophet-king,* 
" look upon me : why hast thou forsaken me 1 O my 
God, I shall cry by day, and thou wilt not hear. . . . 
But thou dAvellest in the holy place. . . I am a worm 
and no man ; the reproach of men, and the outcast of 
the people. . . My God, depart not from me ; for tribu- 
lation is very near, for there is none to help me. . . I 
am poured out like water ; and all my bones are scat- 
tered. My heart is become like wax melting, my 
strength is dried up like a potsherd. . . . They have 
pierced my hands and feet ; they have numbered all my 
bones. . . . They parted my garments amongst them, 
and upon my vesture they cast lots. But thou, O Lord, 
remove not thy help to a distance from me ; look 
towards my defence." 

APPLICATION. 

Yes; Jesus is indeed, as the prophets saw him, suffer- 
ing all manner of pains, abandoned by all, a prey to the 
most incalculable, the most bitter, the most acute agony 
of soul - and body. 

Let us adore him suffering the pain of abandonment 
on the part of God his Father. Let us often call to 
* Ps.. xxi. 1-20. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 293 

mind that he suffers it for us, on our account, in our 
place, to merit for us that we may not be abandoned by 
God. 

Let us suffer spiritual aridity in union with. Jesus for- 
saken. There are for us, as for all men, hours of weari- 
ness, painful moments when earth seems marble and 
heaven brass ; when our mind, shrouded in darkness, 
appears unable to conceive, or form a pious thought ; 
moments when the soul, with a sense of great suffering, 
cries out: a My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken 
me ? " Well ! let us then remember the abandonment of 
Jesus on the cross, and in union with him remain pa- 
tient and resigned. 

Let us act in the same way when we are forsaken, 
abandoned, outraged even on the part of men : let us 
bear it for the love of Our Divine Savior, and for the 
expiation of our faults. 

Let us reflect on the state of our conscience ; and if we 
are, unfortunately, in disgrace with God, let us hear our 
suffering Jesus, saying to us : " Why hast thou for- 
saken me ? " Ah ! he also says so to us when we are in 
tepidity, when we do not visit him in his Sacrament, 
when we do not adore him within ourselves, when we 
are heedless of his presence. He says so to us when 
we do not exercise charity towards our brethren, 
towards our pupils. 

Let us cease, then, to give him cause to say so. 
Whatsoever our trials may be, let us be always his, 
and devoted to his service. 



294 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

PRAYER. 

It is just, O my Divine Savior ! that I suffer something 
of what thou didst suffer ; that I participate, at least to 
a certain degree, in the chalice which I ought to drink 
entire. I resign myself, therefore, to suffer whatsoever 
thou wilt ; and, if it be thy will, to feel only spiritual 
dryness and aridity. Oh ! why should I aspire to 
interior consolations — I who have sinned so often, and 
who have so many times deserved to be forsaken by 
God for ever ? 

No, no, Lord ! I ask thee not for those joys of the soul 
wherewith thou sometimes rewardest thy saints on 
earth, but for patience to endure the privation of them ; 
and if thou wilt that I remain with thee on the cross, 
that I suffer all my life the being deprived of all sensi- 
ble consolation, I willingly accept that trial, O my Jesus ! 
in the thought that I shall thereby become more 
like to thee; and that one day, in the abode where 
pain and sorrow are not, thou wilt make me enjoy the 
supreme felicity which the possession of God produces 
in souls. 

(See Resumes, page 406.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 295 

FIFTIETH MEDITATION. 
JESUS SUFFERING THIRST. 



I thirst."— St. John, xix. 38. 



CONSIDERATION. 

For more than twelve hours has Jesus been a prey 
to every suffering without receiving any relief, without 
having taken any nourishment, without even a moment's 
rest. His agony in the garden of Olives, the ill usage 
he received in the streets of Jerusalem, in the house of 
Caiaphas, in the palace of Herod, his scourging, his 
crowning with thorns, the outrages heaped upon him by 
the governor's soldiers, the carrying of the cross, the 
crucifixion, the effusion of his blood on the wood of his 
sacrifice, — have exhausted all his strength, so that if 
it were not through a miracle, he would be already 
dead. 

And now he feels the most burning thirst. An 
inward fire consumes him, and thus adds to the 
frightful torments to which he is a prey. 

Ah ! it is at this moment that he can repeat what he 
had said by the mouth of David : " My strength is 
dried up like a potsherd ; . . . and my tongue hath 
cleaved to my jaws. I am smitten as grass, and my 
heart is withered."* 

* Ps., xxi. 16; ci. 5. 



296 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

Let us fix our eyes on our divine Savior suffering the 
torment of excessive thirst : let us contemplate his 
parched lips, his inflamed mouth opening to breathe a 
little cooling air. Let us hear his difficult breathing, 
and read in his eyes the violence of the fever that con- 
sumes him. 

What sick person is there — even the poorest — who 
has not, in his last moments, at least a little water to 
quench his thirst f Well ! what all have at their com- 
mand Our Divine Savior has not ; he is deprived of it 
at the very moment when he most needs it. 

Yes, Christian souls, at this moment, the Lamb immo- 
lated for us is wholly consumed on the altar of 
holocaust, and expiates, bv a particular torment, the 
sins that men have committed by the sense of taste ; at 
this moment, he who is the Source of living waters, the 
mystic Fountain of eternal life, feels a devouring thirst ; 
at this moment, the God who created the immensity of 
waves, is reduced to such a point as to long for some 
drops of water. 

Oh ! how great is the pain of our beloved Savior ! . . . 
and he endures it for several hours, without complaining, 
without even making it known. 

Yet, now when about to die, he is going to mani- 
fest it, in order to inspire us with horror for the sins 
of sensuality he is expiating, and also to accomplish 
what he had foretold of himself: "In my thirst they 
gave me vinegar to drink." 

He says, " I thirst ;" and immediately, as if in ful- 
filment of the prophecy, one of the soldiers dips a 
sponge in vinegar, puts it on the end of a reed, and 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 297 

offers it to him ; and our adorable Savior presses his 
divine lips to it. . . 

" What ! " exclaims St. Augustine, " the God of 
goodness who provides for us the coolness of water and 
the sweetness of honey, receives from the hands of men 
only vinegar for drink ! " 

Ah ! like that great saint, let us be astonished and 
indignant at so much cruelty on the part of the enemies 
of our divine Redeemer. Yet, let us raise our hearts 
and minds to other considerations that lead us farther 
into the spirit of the mystery of the thirst of Jesus on 
the cross. 

This thirst which Jesus feels on the cross is real, and 
it is one of the greatest torments he has endured ; but 
it is also symbolical, and it is especially under this 
second aspect that it imports us to regard it. 

By the words :t I thirst," Jesus manifests how much 
he desires the glory of Grod his Father, th# con version of 
sinners, the perseverance of the just, our advancement 
in perfection, the establishment and reign of his. Church. 

The cry, u I thirst," is that of his heart which is 
consumed by the fire of charity, and wishing that we 
may return him love for love, sacrifice for sacrifice, and 
that we may all obtain the salvation lie merits for us 
by his sufferings and death. 

Oh! if we conceived what that thirst of Jesus was, 
with what eagerness we would respond to his calK' how 
we would hasten to offer him the pure water •that ibe 
asks ! with what fidelity we would correspond with his 
graces, and apply ourselves to become cfcaily more per- 
fect, to maintain and develop in oar hearts the fire of, 



298 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

holy love ! with what zeal we would labor for the sal- 
vation of souls. 

Yes, Jesus on the cross was devoured by the thirst for 
souls ; and that thirst he still feels. 

Let us contemplate him in his holy tabernacle, and 
ask ourselves what desires are in his heart, what he 
wants of us. Ah ! we shall hear him say on the altar as 
on the cross, "I thirst;" I burn to see men glorify 
my Father, depart from the way of evil, escape the 
tyranny of the devil, abandon error, attach themselves to 
truth alone, labor with ardor on the work of their salva- 
tion, apply to themselves the fruits of my sacrifice, and 
merit to participate in the eternal glory I have acquired 
for them. 

APPLICATION. 

Jesus says to us, "I thirst;" but what effect will 
those words h^e on our soul ? Shall they leave us 
insensible, indifferent ? or shall they excite in our hearts 
the compassion they ought to inspire, and, above all, 
lead us to accomplish what they make known to us of 
our divine Master's will ? 

Jesus says to us, "I thirst;" — well! what are we 
going to offer him ? Shall it be the pure water of 
sanctity, the generous wine of charity ? or shall it be 
the vinegar and gall of tepidity, or, perhaps, infidelity ? 

In this latter case, how unhappy we should be ; how 
cruel to him and to us ; how unworthy of the benefits 
wherewith he loads us ! Imitators of the Jews, we 
should deserve to have the fate of the Jews, — to be 
rejected by God. . . 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 299 

No, no, let it not be so. Animated by love and 
gratitude, let us hasten to satisfy the desires of the 
heart of Jesus. 

Let us devote ourselves joyfully and unreservedly for 
the greater glory of God the Father, and promote it 
with the most active and perfect zeal. Let us labor 
with all our strength to make that good Master, to whom 
we have consecrated ourselves, known, loved, and 
served. 

Let us pray with fervor for the conversion of sinners, 
for the preservation of the innocence of children, for the 
increase of piety in our brothers, for the maintenance 
of regularity in our communities. 

Above all, let us labor with courage and constancy 
at our own perfection, remembering that this is what 
is principally demanded of us by the divine Savior who 
has called us to his service. Let us behold in him our 
Master and our model, and imitate him. To that end 
let us embrace the practices of interior and exterior 
mortification ; let us contradict our nature, crucify our 
passions, and when we suffer from any privation, 
remember that on the cross Jesus was deprived of all, 
and that in his thirst he had only vinegar to drink. . . 

PRAYER. 
Jesus, divine Lamb, whom I contemplate and adore 
on the altar of holocaust ! holy Victim who dost con- 
sume thyself for the glory of thy heavenly Father and 
to save us ! I have heard thee cry, " I thirst ; " I have 
understood that thou dost manifest by those mysterious 
words the greatness of the torment thou endurest, and 



300 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

also thy desire that all men may apply to themselves 
the merits of thy sacrifice, and work out their .salvation ! 
Grant me, then, O Lord ! to enter into the spirit of 
the mystery on which thou callest me to meditate, to 
compassionate with all my heart the excessive suffering 
thou dost feel, to deplore the cruelty of the Jews who 
refuse thee even a little water. Give me to understand well 
with all thy saints, that thou dost thirst after my perfec- 
tion ; and, especially, to satisfy that thirst, by advancing 
courageously and constantly towards the term whereto 
thou callest me, and which I hope to attain by the help 
of the grace thou didst merit for me on the cross. 

(See Resumes, page 406.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST, 301 

FIFTY-FIRST. MEDITATION. 
JESUS SAYS: "ALL IS CONSUMMATED." 



When Jesus had taken the \inegar, he said, 'All is con- 
summated.' " — St. John, xix. 30. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us go, Christian souls, to Calvary, to the foot of 
the Cross, whereon Jesus is soon to expire. Let us 
cast our eyes on that Adorable Victim, at the moment 
when the bloody Sacrifice of our reconciliation is about 
to end. Let us hear our divine Master, speaking with 
a strong voice those words so rich in salutary teach- 
ings : " All is consummated." 

Let us meditate on them attentively, and animate our- 
selves with the different meanings they present. 

" All is consummated !" — I have accomplished all that 
my Father had decreed for me, and which, as God, I 
had determined to accomplish. I have done the will of 
him who sent me ; I have become obedient even unto 
death, and the death of the cross. I have fulfilled in 
every point the mission given me from above. 

" All is consummated ! " — My blood has all flowed 
through the wounds wherewith my body is covered ; my 
strength is exhausted ; I am suffering my last pains ; my 
life is ending ; behold th 
allow death to strike me. 



302 MEDITATION'S ON THE PASSION 

" All is consummated! " — I consider what the Prophets 
have written of me, and what the Jewish worship pre- 
figured, and I see that every thing relating to me is 
realized. 

Yes, I have accomplished all that was revealed of 
the Messiah : I have been a Man of Sorrows, and 
acquainted with infirmity ;* my apparel has been red 
with my blood ;t I have borne the iniquity of all ;$ my 
enemies, like furious bulls, have besieged me ;§ I have 
paid that which I took not away ;|| waters have flowed 
over my head ;^[ I, the Root of Jesse, have stood for an 
ensign of the people ;** I have been lifted up as Moses 
lifted up the serpent in the desert ;tf my garments have 
been divided by lot.Jt They have given me gall for 
my food, and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to 
drink. §§ 

" All is consummated ! " — Figurative religion has 
ceased ; the ancient sacrifices give place to the only true 
sacrifice predicted by these words : " In every place 
there is sacrifice, and there is offered to my name a clean 
oblation." || || 

"All is consummated!" — The bloody sacrifice of the 
New Law is ended, the world is redeemed ; I have done 
all that divine justice required ; I have wrought an 
abundant and superabundant redemption ; I have amply 
satisfied for all the sins of men ; I have paid the price of 
their ransom ; they are now reconciled with God ; the 

* Isa., liii. 3. t IM&., lxiii. 2. \ Ibid., liii. G. § Ps., 
xxi. 13. || Tbid., lxviii. 5. If Lament., iii. 54. ** Isa., xi. 
10. ft St. John, iii. 14. ft Ps - xxi - 19 - §§ Ihkl - lxviiL 22 - 
|!|l Mai., i. 11. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 303 

sentence of their condemnation is annulled ; the gates of 
Paradise are about to be opened to them. 

"All is consummated ! " — I triumph over death and* 
hell ; the hour of the powers of darkness is past ; I reign 
henceforth by this wood to which my enemies have fast- 
ened me. This is the sceptre of my power, before which 
all heads shall bow. 

" All is consummated !''£ — The law of grace has replaced 
the law of fear ; the expectation of nations is fulfilled ; 
I have done for men all that my heart inspired ; the infi- 
nite treasures of my merits are acquired for them ; noth- 
ing is wanting for their sanctification and salvation ; I 
have finished the work for which I came on this earth. 

Light has shone in darkness. Every belief necessary 
for humanity, is revealed ; my holy Church, which is the 
pillar of truth, is founded for all time ; my religion is 
established, and will overspread the whole earth to make 
the most heroic virtues grow and flourish. From my 
feet and hands go forth four rivers of blood which, like 
the four rivers of the terrestrial paradise, are going to 
fertilize the world, and to call forth apostles, martyrs, 
confessors, virgins, penitents, saints, in such numbers 
that no one can count them. 

" All is consummated ! " — I have gone through — with- 
out grVing way to either impatience or discourage- 
ment — a career the most painful, the most thwarted by 
the contradictions of men. I have been constant even 
unto death, and from the term which I have now reached, 
I teach all Christians that it is not enough to enter on 
the way of salvation, but that they must persevere even 
to the end to merit being crowned. 



304 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

APPLICATION. 

Reflecting on the different meanings of these words, 
" All is consummated/' let us impress well on our minds 
what Jesus suffered ; let us regard the web of his sor- 
rows from his Incarnation till the moment which is about 
to end them ; let us measure, as much as we possibly 
can, the cup of bitterness he drained. . . 

Let us then reflect that it was for us he suffered, and 
ask ourselves what sentiments of gratitude ought to 
animate our heart, and what works they ought to make 
us produce. 

Kneeling at the foot of the cross whereon the adora- 
ble Victim of our redemption is shedding all his blood, 
let us renounce sin, and renounce it for ever. Let us 
weep those sins which we have committed; let us ask 
pardon through the merits of the superabundant satis- 
faction of the Divine Savior, and do real penance for 
them. 

All is accomplished on the part of Jesus in the work 
of our salvation 5 but not on ours. Members of his 
mystic body, we must participate in his sufferings, we 
must courageously embrace the practice of mortification, 
so that we may say with the Apostle : "I fill up, in 
my flesh, those things that are wanting of the sufferings 
of Christ."* 

Let us prepare ourselves, by a holy and penitential 
life, for the supreme moment when he shall say to us : 
" All is consummated." Happy if we are then in the 
grace of God ! 

* Col., i. 24. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 305 

" All is consummated," says the just man dying ; that 
is to say: "My troubles are over, my trials are at an 
end, the reward I had in view is now before me. It 
required efforts, it is true, to be humble, obedient, 
mortified, faithful to all my duties ; but, now, nothing 
remains of my troubles save a consoling remembrance. 
God is preparing for me a throne of glory, and will 
give me for my portion the true freedom of his children. 
Called to the Heavenly Jerusalem, I am going to enjoy 
the vision of my God, to contemplate forever the holy 
humanity of my divine Redeemer, to dwell in heaven 
with Mary, to sing with the Angels and Saints the 
eternal hymn of gratitude. happiness ! all is con- 
summated. ' I have fought a good fight ; I have 
finished my course : I have kept the faith ; for the 
rest, there is laid up for me a crown of justice.' "* 

"All is consummated," shall the dying sinner say: 
" My life is at an end : pleasures, honors, riches, luxu- 
ries, banquets, worldly joys — all is over, all is ended for 
me ! I leave all I have loved, and I take with me only 
the sins of which I am guilty, and which shall be the 
cause of my condemnation. . . ' All is consummated.' 
Hell is henceforth my only portion. I have now to 
begin that fiery torture, which is never to end." 

Soon shall we, too, say: "All is consummated!" 
Shall it be to express that we have done all that God 
ordained for us — all that he had demanded for us by our 
holy Rules — all that he had prescribed to us by our 
superiors ? or, on the contrary, shall it be to say that we 
* 2 Tim., iv. 7, 8. 



306 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

have abused his graces, that we have not profited by 
the means of salvation he offers us in our state ? . . . 

Let us think that that depends on the life we now 
lead, and on that we may lead in future. 

PRAYER. 

Lord ! continue and consummate my salvation ; it is 
thy work, it is worthy of thee, O, my divine Redeemer! 
and it cost thee too dear to leave it imperfect. I know 
that thy holy passion, wholly consummated as it is on 
thy part, will not open heaven at the moment of my 
death if I do not bear thy image in myself, and if I do 
not, by the practice of mortification, participate in thy 
pains. Oh ! I beseech thee, by the merits of thy suf- 
ferings and death, grant that, in imitation of the 
apostle, I may keep the faith in all its purity, that I 
may sustain it by good works, and that I may finish my 
course in the way of good. 

(See Resumes, page 407.) 






OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 307 



FIFTY-SECOND MEDITATION. 
JESUS COMMENDS HIS SOUL TO HIS FATHER. 



; ' Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit. "- 
St. Luke, xxiii. 46. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Behold the final moment when the loveliest, the 
holiest, the most admirable life that ever was, is about 
to end in the most ignominious death. Our Divine 
Redeemer is going to finish on the cross the long and 
painful combat he was to fight for our salvation. He 
has nothing more to do but return to his heavenly Father, 
to rest after his innumerable toils and sufferings in his 
glorious bosom. 

Yet, before dying, or rather when dying, he speaks 
still to men and instructs them in the most sublime 
manner. Let us gather around his feet, Christian souls, 
and listen with sentiments of the most profound adora- 
tion to his last words, which he speaks in a strong 
voice, as if to impress them deeply on our minds, to 
engage us to meditate upon them in our heart, and to 
repeat them after him. 

The Gospel relates that Jesus, after having said, 
"All is consummated!" cries out : " Father, into thy 
hands I commend my spirit." 

Jesus addresses his Father : he does not say as 



308 MEDITATIONS OX THE PASSION 

before, " My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken 
me?" but rather, manifesting the greatest confidence, 
" Father, into Thy hands I commend my spirit." 

These words, which are, as it were, the last clause of 
his Testament, are also a perfect act of adoration from 
his holy humanity to God his Father. In the supper, 
Jesus gave to men his body and blood under the species 
of bread and wine ; on Calvary, he bequeathed to them 
his Blessed Mother, at the same time that he sacrificed 
his life for them. He has nothing left but his soul, and 
he offers it to him from whom he received it — to God 
who is the beginning of all things, and to whom all that 
has its origin in him, must return. 

Oh ! how lovingly the celestial Father receives that 
soul which Jesus resigns into his hands — that soul 
hypostatically united to the Word, radiant with all the 
splendor of the Word — that soul which infinitely loved 
and glorified him — that soul which had no thought, no 
desire, no Mill but for him. 

By the soul which dying Jesus confides to his 
Father, let us understand not only this perfect .and 
divine spirit which, with his sacred body, consti- 
tutes his holy humanity, but likewise all the faithful 
who are miited to this divine Savior ; for, says St. 
Paul, " he who adheres to the Lord, is one spirit with 
him."* 

Thus, as St. Athanasius affirms, when the Son of God 
commends his soul into the hands of his Father, he com- 
mends to him at that same time all those who are his 
members, and who live by his life. 
* 1 Cor., vi. 17. 



OF OUR LORD "JESUS CHRIST. 309 

Oh ! what ought not our gratitude to be to Jesus, our 
divine Head ! He commended our soul to his Father, 
he resigned it into his hands ! God, who bears him 
always,* will receive it, therefore, into the bosom of his 
infinite goodness ; he will preserve it, will load it with 
joy and bliss, and will, one day, re-unite it to our body, 
to make it through it living and glorious. 

Let us then re-animate our hope. Jesus is our 
Head and our model ; what he does in that capacity he 
enjoins on us to do, and has merited for us that grace. 
We, too, can therefore say with sweet security at the 
moment of death : " Father, into thy hands I commend 
my spirit," and having the most entire confidence that 
God will receive that soul, as he received that of his 
adorable Son, with which it is united by the bond of 
charity. 

Jesus Christ is our Redeemer — he destroyed sin which 
sets enmity between God and our souls ; there is then 
nothing now to prevent the latter from being admitted 
by God after death, from entering immediately into pos- 
session of the infinite happiness they are called to enjoy : 
each one of us may now desire, with St. Paul, to 
be loosened from the bonds of thisbody,t to go to dwell 
with Jesus in the bosom of the heavenly Father. 

Jesus Christ is our Master: in crying on the cross, 
"Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit," he 
teaches us that death is not destruction, but only a 
separation of the soul from the body ; that our soul, 
coming from God, is to return to God ; that the accept- 
ance of death is truly an act of adoration whereby we 
* St. John, xi. 42. + Phil., i. 23. 



810 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

acknowledge God as the Sovereign Lord of all things, as 
our beginning and our end, as he from whom we have 
received our soul and to whom we ought to yield it up. 

Jesus, by these words, makes us understand that of 
itself death is not to be dreaded ; that it is, in reality, 
but the happy moment when the faithful Christian 
gives back his soul into the hands of him from whom 
he received it ; when he returns to his Father and casts 
himself lovingly into his merciful arms ; when he says 
in union with Jesus who, then especially, assists him 
with his grace, "Father, into thy hands I commend my 
spirit ;" remember that it is the breath of thy mouth, 
the price of thy Son's blood, the fruit of his labors. 
Vouchsafe, I beseech thee, to welcome it kindly into 
the bosom of thy clemency. 

Happy the Christian who, in his last moments, is in 
these dispositions ! He does sweet violence to God by 
this absolute confidence ; he unites with the dying 
Jesus whose merits he applies to himself; he begins 
with the words, " Father, into -thy hands I commend 
my spirit," the song of gratitude which he will continue 
in heaven. 

APPLICATION. 

Let us often think of the final hour when our soul 
shall be demanded back. Ah ! it ought to be, so to 
say, the whole occupation of Christians to dispose them- 
selves for rendering an account of their life to God on 
the day when he shall end it ! That day will soon come 
for each of us : let us think of it and be ready. 

When we shall press to our dying lips the image of 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 311 

the crucifix, it will suggest to us to say, and will say in 
our name, those words of Jesus on the cross, which form 
a part of the prayers for the agonizing : " Father, into 
thy hands I commend my spirit ;" but, that we may 
pronounce them then with confidence, we must repeat 
them frequently with piety during the course of our life, 
and making interiorly the abandonment of ourselves to 
God. 

We must say to him, from the bottom of our heart : 
u Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit," with 
all its thoughts, its desires, its fears. Dispose of me 
according to thy will : I abandon myself to thy Provi- 
dence. Whatever may be the state in which thou 
placest me, the trials thou mayst send me, the tribula- 
tions I may have to undergo, I bless thy holy name. 

We must imitate Jesus Christ, do exactly and lov- 
ingly all that his Father demands of us, to put our- 
selves by his grace in a state to be able to say with 
him : " All is consummated," all is accomplished that 
was commanded us. 

We must unite more and more with that divine 
mediator, establish ourselves in his charity, and per- 
severe therein, live by his life, act as he would act in 
our place, animate ourselves with the same motives, 
propose to ourselves the same ends. 

We must make but one with him, so that our soul 
belonging truly to his mystic soul and being in one 
sense his, he may say of it, at the moment of our death : 
"Father, into thy hands I commend this soul which is 
mine and which I have saved." 

Let us earnestly ask of him the grace of that union 



312 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

with him by which his Father, seeing him in us, will 
receive our soul as he received his, and admit him 
amongst the blessed souls and the angelic hosts, in the 
abode of eternal rest. 

PRAYER. 

O Jesus, adorable victim ! remember that on the cross 
thou didst recommend my soul to God in recommend- 
ing to him those of all who believe in thee, and who are 
thy members : ah ! I beseech thee by thy wounds, by 
thy blood, by thy death, grant that thy prayer may 
have its full efficacy in me. 

O my Savior ! save my soul ; consider it as being 
thine ; and, at my death, come, O generous Redeemer ! 
to take it and present it to God, telling him to receive it 
into the bosom of his infinite clemency. Amen. 

(See Resumes, page 407.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 313 

FIFTY-THIRD MEDITATION. 
JESUS DIES ON THE CROSS. 



"Bowing his head, he gave up the ghost." — St. John, xix. 30. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us go in spirit to Calvary; let us draw near to 
the cross which is the altar of the great sacrifice, and 
let us keep our eyes fixed on the Divine Lamb expiring 
on that gibbet to take away the sins of the world. 

Behold the final moment ; the bloody sacrifice of our 
reconciliation with God is drawing to a close ; he who is 
at once the priest and the victim gives himself up to 
death. " Jesus," says the evangelist, "bowing his head, 
gave up the ghost." Oh ! what a subject is offered to 
our meditation ! what lessons are there given us ! what 
sentiments ought such a spectacle to excite in our 
hearts ! 

Jesus bows his head to show that he adores the 
decrees of heaven, that he resigns himself to death, that 
he accepts it in order to accomplish the will of his 
father, as St. Paul remembers, saying : " He humbled 
himself, becoming obedient unto death, even the death of 
the cross."* He bows his head to permit death to 
strike him ; for death, as St. Athanasius says, would 
not have dared to approach the Lord of life, if he had 
* Phil., ii. 8. 
14 



314 MEDITATIONS OX THE PASSION 

not himself called him. Finally, lie bows his head to 
give us all the kiss of peace and reconciliation. 

Jesus bows his head, and dies. . . Jesus is dead ! 
Ah ! what a subject for astonishment, regret, and tears ! 
Jesus is dead ! he, the author of life, the Father of the 
world to come, the Son of the living God. . . Jesus is 
dead ! he, our master, he, the spouse of our souls, the 
only object of our love ! and he is dead on the cross ! 

O Christian souls, contemplate on the wood to which 
it is fastened, the sacred body of your Divine Savior ; 
behold that head weighed down and hanging earthwards, 
that motionless brow, those darkened eyes, that closed 
mouth. Contemplate that face so beautiful, which re- 
flected a divine soul, now pale and disfigured. " Con- 
sider," says St. Bona venture, " that crown of thorns and 
those murderous nails, those wounds in the hands and feet, 
that body covered over with wounds, that mangled 
flesh , and see by these tokens how much Jesus has 
loved thee." 

Yes, let us keep our eyes fixed on Jesus dead on the 
cross. Let us contemplate him in union with Mary, the 
most desolate of all mothers, and suffering, at this 
moment especially, the greatest sorrow that ever was. 
Let us contemplate him, like Magdalen, with sentiments 
of the most ardent love, and of the liveliest repentance 
for our faults, which are the true cause of his death. 
Let us contemplate him, like the soldiers who crucified 
him, and who, as soon as he expired, strike their breasts 
and confess that he is truly the Son of God. 

Jesus is God ! But why was it necessary that his 
life should be thus sacrificed ? Wherefore did he die, 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 315 

— he the author of life, and innocence itself? Ah ! it is 
that he would, by an effect of his charity and generosity, 
pay to God his Father an infinite homage, in reparation 
for the outrages we have offered to that divine Majesty ; 
it is that he woidd deliver us from the death we had 
merited, open to us the heaven that was closed since 
the first sin, confirm the testament he had made in our 
favor, and put us in possession of all the treasures of 
his grace. 

Jesus is dead, because we are sinners and he has 
had pity on us ; because, notwithstanding our sins, he 
has loved us, and loved us even to preferring us to him- 
self : his death, therefore, is at once the work of our 
iniquity and of his love. Ah ! how it ought to excite 
in our hearts the most perfect gratitude and contrition ! 

O Jesus ! thy death is my work, wherefore it is that 
I will always deplore it ; but it is also the work of thy 
charity for me, wherefore I will love thee, in return, with 
all the affection of which I am capable. I will open 
my heart to hope, for thy sacrifice is the beginning of 
my happiness, my reconciliation with Grod, my restora- 
tion to the state from which I had fallen by sin. 

Jesus is dead — he who represented entire humanity : 
the warrant that condemned us all to die, has, therefore, 
been executed on him ; but, henceforth, that warrant 
is annulled in regard to us ; and, consequently, if we 
are united to Jesus Christ, the death we ought all to 
undergo is no longer as a punishment inflicted on us, 
but is rather a reward ; since, by it, we enter on 
the enjoyment of the glory which that divine Redeemer 
has acquired for us. 



316 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

Jesus is dead ! his work is, therefore, accomplished ; 
earth is reconciled with heaven ; God, whose justice is 
satisfied, sees again in men his beloved children ; the 
way of salvation is open to all peoples ; the Church is 
founded, the sacraments are instituted, the seed of 
truth is sown on earth, and fertilized by the divine 
blood that flowed, it is going to bud forth, to propagate 
itself, to overspread the whole earth ; the Jewish wor- 
ship is abolished, the prophetic religion becomes object- 
less ; the ancient covenant is replaced by the New : 
thus the veil of the temple which concealed the taber- 
nacle and the holy of holies, is suddenly rent from top 
to bottom — in fact, what use was that veil then, since 
the true Holy of Holies, elevated on the cross on Calvary, 
was before the eyes of the whole world ? . . . 

APPLICATION. 

Let us profoundly adore, on the wood to which he is 
fastened, Jesus dead for us ; and let us admire the 
ineffable prodigy of grace which is being wrought. O 
mystery which is to the Jews as a stumbling-block, and 
to the gentiles foolishness!*- the Just One has sacrificed 
himself for sinners, the Master for the slaves 1 A God is 
dead for man. . . 

Yes, Jesus is dead for us ; but, furthermore, he is 
dead through us sinners, the true authors of his immola- 
tion. None amongst us can say: "I am innocent of the 
blood of this Just man."t 

Let us, then, bewail our transgressions, and make, at 

J 1 Cor., i, 23. f St. Matt., xxvii. 24. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHEIST. 317 

the foot of the cross, the resolution of doing true pen- 
ance, and of never more committing sin. 

At the thought of .the Savior's death, let us revive in 
our hearts the hope of pardon. Whatever may be our 
faults, let us trust that the heavenly Father will show us 
mercy, in virtue of the infinite merits of the death of 
his adorable Son. 

Let us often represent to mind Jesus dead on the 
cross, because that image always produces salutary 
fruits in our soids ; but let us particularly represent him 
to ourselves during the holy Sacrifice of the Mass, when 
as Priest and Victim, he continues to offer to Grod, for 
our salvation, that death he underwent on Calvary. 

Let us place ourselves before that mysterious wood 
to which is fastened the body of him who " made him- 
self a curse for us,"* and think of what love and what 
gratitude we owe him ! . . . 

Ah ! how could we contemplate him on the cross 
without being penetrated with sentiments of the liveliest 
affection, without being led to devote ourselves unre- 
servedly for him, and to have no other desire than to 
sacrifice ourselves for his glory ! 

Let us ask, through the merits of his death, a true 
spirit of penance, and the grace to grow in his charity 
till the moment when he shall call us to another life, to 
enjoy the fruits of his redemption. 

PRAYER. 

Jesus ! my beloved Savior ! whom I contemplate 
in the arms of death and on the bloody altar of Calvary, 
* Gal., iii. 13. 



oiy MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

behold the feelings that crowd upon me. Considering 
thee, my heart is breaking with regret, my soul breathes 
forth into sighs and groans ; my tears furrow my cheeks 
and, like those of Magdalen, mingle with thy blood 
shed at the foot of the cross. 

Yes, Lord ! I understand how unhappy I have been 
in having offended thee. Ah ! I will bewail my unfaith- 
fulness, which has been the true cause of thy immolation, 
and I will always bewail them. But, O my Jesus ! I 
will also open my heart to hope, for I know thou didst 
undergo death to restore me to life. 

O divine Savior ! give me to participate in the fruits 
of thine immolation. Remember, O good Jesus ! that 
for me thou art on the cross, and reject me not. Grant, 
Lord ! that my soul, which has cost thee so much, may 
be delivered from the evil from which thou came to 
deliver it ; and that one day, in heaven, near thy glorious 
throne, O victorious Lamb ! I may be admitted to do 
thee homage for the crown of my perseverance, and to 
sing with the saints the eternal canticle of gratitude and 
love. 

(See Resumes, page 408.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 319 

FIFTY-FOURTH MEDITATION. 
THE BODY OF JESUS PIERCED BY THE SPEAR. 



"They shall look on him whom they pierced." — 
St. John, xix. 37. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Jesus had said, speaking of the kind of death he was 
to undergo : " When I shall be lifted up from the earth, 
I will draw all things to myself;"* now at the very 
moment when he expires on the cross, he fulfils this 
prediction. 

The veil of the temple is rent from top to bottom, to 
signify that all sacrifices are abolished, and that there 
is henceforth but one single sacrifice — that of the cross ; 
the earth trembles, the rocks are rent, sepulchres open ; 
even inanimate nature manifests its horror of the crime 
committed. 

The centurion placed in front of the cross, and 
the soldiers who keep guard on Jesus, affrighted by 
what they see, give glory to God, saying, u Indeed, 
this was a just man ;"t the multitude of spectators went 
away striking their breasts,J and deploring the deicide 
of which their nation was guilty. 

So from this very moment, the Savior's death pro- 

* St. John, xii. 32. f St. Luke, xxiii. 47; St. Matt., xxvii. 54. 
t St. Luke, xxiii. 48. 



320 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

duces fruits of, sanctification. Jesus draws souls to 
himself by the way of penance ; numberless graces 
come down from the cross on men who, according to 
the prophecy of Isaiah, " shall draw waters with joy 
from the Savior's fountains."* 

These fountains are opened to them by each of the 
wounds of the divine Victim, and they are going to be 
more so still by that which shall be made in his heart, 
the source and plenitude of all graces. 

Love had inspired every action of Jesus ; love had 
led him to death, and to a death the most cruel and igno- 
minious ; but in him love is stronger than death, and he 
is going to manifest it in the most admirable manner. 

The sabbath of the Pasch being about to commence, 
the Jews had asked Pilate to have the legs of Jesus and 
the thieves broken, so that the bodies might not remain 
exposed on a day so solemn. 

Soldiers come, accordingly, and break the legs of 
both the thieves, in order to hasten their death. Com- 
ing to Jesus, they see that he is dead : they do not break 
his legs, thus accomplishing what was written of the 
Paschal Lamb, the figure of the divine Victim : 
" Neither shall you break a bone thereof. "t 

But it was likewise written : " They shall look upon 
me whom they have pierced ;"$ and those words are 
about to be fulfilled. A soldier approaches the cross, 
and, striking the body of Jesus in the side with his 
lance, he makes a deep wound, whence there come out 
blood and water. § 

* Isa., xii. 3. f Exod., xii. 46. J Zach., xii. 10. 

<* St. John, xix. 34. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 321 

With the saints, let us contemplate this wound made 
in the side of Jesus, and by it penetrate to the sacred 
heart which it discloses, and which was itself pierced 
by the iron. 

That heart is the focus of pure love, the furnace of 
charity. Love was the principle of its every motion, 
and though it is stilled by death, it is nevertheless 
about to give us the most precious pledge of love ; it is 
going to open in order to communicate to us the 
treasures of grace it contains, and to shed on the earth 
the last drops of the blood of redemption and the water 
that purifies and sanctifies. 

That heart, the model of charity, is likewise that of 
all virtues. Jesus had said : " Learn of me, for I am 
meek and humble of heart/'* thus inviting all men to 
study the perfections of his divine heart. Let us try, 
then, to enter into his views, especially at this moment 
when we contemplate him dead on the cross. 

Let us ask ourselves, to what degree was meekness 
carried by the Divine Lamb slain on the altar of the 
great Sacrifice 1 Let us reflect on the extent to which 
the humility of the Son of God, the Incarnate Word, 
has been carried: — crucified between two thieves, 
loaded with imprecations, degraded, insulted, scoffed, 
overwhelmed with all contempt, expiring at last on an 
infamous gibbet ! 

The heart of Jesus is the seat of goodness, of 

tenderness, of compassion. He bowed down to us to 

soothe and console us ; he took part in all our pains, in 

all our troubles. . . At sight of the crimes and the 

* St. Matt., xi. 22. 



322 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 



soul an immense sorrow ; he wept over Jerusalem, 
wept over impenitent sinners, wept over all miseries, all 
misfortunes. 

The heart of Jesus is our asylum, our refuge, our 
defence : there we are beyond the reach of the thunders 
of the avenging God, the dreadful strokes of his justice 
irritated by our sins ; there the enemies of salvation may 
not enter : it is an impregnable fortress, at the base of 
which all their efforts break ; there is the " clift of the 
rock" where the dove is sheltered from the pursuit of 
the vulture.* Happy are they who, like St. Eleazar, 
can say : " I dwell in the wound in the side of Jesus, 
in his very heart ! There I take up my abode." There 
my soul is in safety, and tastes the sweetest, the most 
desirable, peace. 

O divine heart, hypostatically united to the Word, and 
the organ of his infinite love ! O heart worthy the 
homage of heaven and earth, and before which all nations 
shall bow down ! O heart by which our homage makes 
its way to God — mediating heart which conveys to the 
heavenly Father all our acts of love and piety ! 

O generous heart which is neither repelled nor dis- 
couraged by contradiction and ingratitude — heart that 
answered outrages only by benefits — heart that so loved 
as to sacrifice itself even for those who had only hatred 
for it ! 

Ah ! could one consider thee and not be transported 
with the desire of responding to thy love by the greatest 
love i of devoting one's self to thy worship ? of blessing 
* Cant., ii. 14. 



OF OUR LORD JEStJS CHRIST. 323 

and glorifying thee f of laboring unceasingly to increase 
the number of thy faithful adorers ? 

APPLICATION. 

Meditating on the sacred heart of Jesus, pierced with 
a lance, let us think of what is felt in this circumstance 
of the passion by the most holy heart of Mary. The 
soul of that tender mother was in the heart of her Son, 
and thus it was she who felt the iron that pierced it. 
At this moment is realized the prophecy of old Simeon : 
" Thine own soul a sword shall pierce."* 

Let us behold that divine Mother receiving the 
adorable blood from the heart of Jesus, adoring by it 
the justice of the heavenly Father which is henceforth 
satisfied ; blessing the infinite goodness of the Savior who 
has effected, a superabundant redemption, and who 
manifests it by that effusion of blood following on the 
great words ; " All is consummated."t 

Let us adore the fifth wound of Jesus, and call to 
mind what it is for all true disciples of that adorable 
Savior. Let us regard it as the source of grace, the 
refuge of sinners, the voice that most eloquently speaks 
to us of the infinite goodness and love of Jesus for us. 

Let us render to the divine Heart of Jesus the hom- 
age of adoration, love, and gratitude due to it. With 
so great a number of pious souls, let us venerate it in a 
very particular manner on the first Friday of every 
month, receiving it in holy Communion, lovingly con- 
templating its blessed image, meditating on its tender- 
ness, invoking it with fervor, and applying ourselves 
to form our heart to its likeness. 

* St. Luke, ii. 85. + St. John x ix. BO 



324 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

PRAYER. 

" I render thee thanks, Jesus ! for the wound thou 
didst receive on the cross after thy death. It was thy love 
that guided the soldier's hand, and opened at the same 
thrust, thy side and thy sweet heart, that unfailing 
source of sweetness and tenderness. Blessed be that 
saving wound, that most holy wound; blessed be the 
adorable blood and the water of salvation which flowed 
from it to wash away our sins. 

" Wash me, then, good Jesus ! in that sanctifying 
water — I who am a sinner ; — enliven me by that precious 
blood, and when my soul shall depart from this world, 
give me, as viaticum, one drop of that divine drink. 
By thy pierced heart, I beseech thee, most loving 
Jesus! pierce my heart with an arrow of thy love, so 
that it may no longer contain any earthly affection, and 
that it may be wholly given up to the sole and all-pow- 
erful action of thy celestial charity."* 

(See Resumes, page 408.) 



* Prayer of St. Gertrude. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 325 

FIFTY-FIFTH MEDITATION. 
THE FIVE WOUNDS. 



'They have pierced my hands and my feet." — Ps., xxi. 17. 



CONSIDERATION 

Christian souls, let us go to Calvary to contemplate 
there the inanimate body of the divine Redeemer fastened 
to the cross ; let us fix our eyes on those innumerable 
wounds which cover it from head to foot ; let us fix 
them on that august head hanging earthwards, on that 
adorable face soiled, bruised, disfigured ; on those 
motionless eyes, that mouth closed by death. . . . Let 
us behold that divine body, bloody, torn, and, as it were, 
falling to pieces ; finally, let us look upon our Beloved 
in the state to which he has reduced himself ! Yes, he 
is, indeed, such as the prophets saw him,* for there is 
no soundness remaining in his flesh ; at this moment his 
bones are bare — they may be numbered ! . . . 

At this sight, how can we but be penetrated with the 
liveliest emotion and shed teax's in torrents? Ah ! let them 
flow, those tears of compassion, sorrow, love ! Let us 
weep at the foot of the cross and in the presence of our 
God, who has been sacrificed for us ; let us ever keep 
looking upon the sacred body fastened to that cross, and 
the wounds wherewith it is covered. 

* Isa., i. 6; Ps., xxi. 18. 



326 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

But let us consider with more particular attention 
the wounds in the hands and feet and the wound in the 
side, being those of which Jesus vouchsafed to keep the 
marks after his glorious resurrection, and which the 
Church presents more especially to our veneration. 

Let us say to our divine Savior : " Whence come these 
wounds that I see in thy hands, in thy feet, and in thy 
side ?" — and hear him answer, by the prophet Zachary : 
" With these I was wounded in the house of them that 
loved me."* 

Let us understand, then, first of all, that these 
wounds are our work, and that it is we who have 
inflicted them when we have outraged him by our sins. 

Alas ! we have committed a great number by the 
bad use of our feet and of our hands ; and hence it is 
that the feet and hands of our divine Savior were 
pierced with nails. In like manner, our heart was the 
organ of so many inordinate affections ; and on that 
account the heart of Jesus was pierced with the lance, 
and shed, with the last drops of the blood of expiation, 
the sacred water that is to purify us. 

Let the sight of the sacred w r ounds of Jesus excite 
us, therefore, to the liveliest contrition, and inspire us 
with the greatest horror of sin ; let it also keep before 
our mind all that this adorable Redeemer suffered to 
save us. 

And, in fact, are not the five wounds of Jesus elo- 
quent voices reminding us of his pains, relating to us 
the tortures of his crucifixion, and all the torments he 
endured during the long hours he remained on the cross ? 
* Zach., xiii. 6. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 327 

While contemplating those sacred wounds, how could we 
but be penetrated with love and gratitude for him whose 
generosity, devotedness, and infinite love they proclaim 
so loudly? 

The five wounds are for us the motive of the most 
entire confidence in the divine mercy and the assistance 
grace ; they are so many mouths pleading in our behalf of 
before God. By them, Jesus tells his Father that he 
has expiated our crimes, that he satisfied, by the shed- 
ding of his blood, for all that guilty man owed to his 
justice ; that he can, therefore, demand pardon for 
them. 

Oh ! what consolation for us who have so much 
reason to be seized with fear, at thought of the power 
and justice of the God we have offended ! Yes, we may 
ask and obtain our pardon : the wounds of Jesus ask 
and obtain it for us. 

They are a secure asylum to which we are allowed 
to retire ; where the shafts of heavenly vengeance can- 
not penetrate ; neither can the spirit who would fain 
destroy us, for they are the glorious monuments of 
his defeat, and of the victory that Jesus gained over 
hell. 

The Savior's wounds, through which was shed the 
blood of expiation, are also the channels through which 
the graces of salvation are poured forth and shall be 
poured forth upon the earth, till the end of time. 
Christians who contemplate them with faith, feel that 
there emanates from them a secret strength which dis- 
poses them to virtue, to the generous practice of morti- 
fication, to the renunciation of pleasures, to the accom- 



S28 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

plishment of those words of St. Paul : " The world is 
crucified to me, and I to the world."* 

Those wounds are, as it were, the ornament of 
the now glorious body of Jesus, an ornament of his holy 
humanity shining in the heaven of his divine splendor: 
it is their contemplation that makes the delight of the 
elect ; from them radiates the happiness they enjoy and 
which shall last eternally. 

( >h ! how we should desire to be, like them, admitted 
to contemplate them ! With what courage should we 
not dispose ourselves to the practice of the virtues that 
will merit that happiness for us ! 

For the rest, all men shall see those adorable 
wounds, for Jesus will show them to the whole universe 
at the last day, at that final moment when those words 
of Zachary shall be fully accomplished : " They shall 
look on him whom they have pierced,"! and when those 
of St. John in the Apocalypse shall in like manner be 
fulfilled: Behold, he cometh with the clouds; and 
every eye shall see him, and they that pierced him."| 

APPLICATION. 

In what sentiments shall we contemplate those sacred 
wounds, at the great day when our divine Savior will 
show them to the whole universe ? Shall they make 
our happiness, or be the cause of our despair ? 

Ah ! if we would then contemplate them with joy, we 
will often consider them, in this life, in sentiments of a 
sincere sorrow for our sins ; and, if possible, keep them 
ever present to our mind. 

* Gal., vi. 14. + Zach., xii. 10. J Apoc, i. 7. 



OP OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 329 

Let us ask that grace through the intercession of 
Mary, and say to her with the Church : 

' ' O may the wounds of thy dear Son, 
Our contrite hearts possess alone."* 

Let us also remember that, as Christians, we ought to 
exhibit the life and sufferings of Jesus ; that, conse- 
quently, something in us ought to recall the wounds of 
him who is our head and our model : let us ask ourselves 
then, by what do we remind ourselves of those sacred 
wounds ? 

Oh ! how happy we should be did we really exhibit 
them in ourselves by our penitential and mortified life ! 

Let us often place our crucifix before our eyes, and 
press it to our heart and our lips. Let us kiss with a 
lively faith and a holy respect the marks of the five 
wounds ; and in the effusion of the liveliest sentiments of 
love and confidence, let us ask, through each of them, 
some special grace. 

PRAYER. 

O Jesus ! generous Redeemer, who callest me at this 
moment to contemplate thy five wounds, monuments of 
thy sufferings and thine infinite love ! behold me before 
thee, my heart penetrated with sorrow for my sins, and, 
nevertheless, full of confidence because of the satisfac- 
tion thou didst offer for me to the God whom I have 
offended ; hear the prayer which I address to thee at 
this moment when, thinking of thy holy passion, I let 
my soul open to the hope of being heard. 

* Hymn Stabat Mater. 



330 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

I adore the sacred wound in thy right hand ; and, by 
it, I beseech thee to pour thy most abundant favors on 
our holy Father the Pope, and on all our superiors. 

I adore the sacred wound in thy left hand ; and, by 
it, I recommend to thee my parents, my brothers, my 
pupils, to whom I beseech thee to grant special graces 
of salvation. 

I adore the sacred wound in thy right foot ; and, by 
it, I ask of thee the perseverance of the just, the main- 
tenance of all Religious in the way of perfection. 

I adore the sacred wound in thy left foot ; and, by 
it, I ask of thee, O Jesus ! the conversion of sinners 
and the deliverance of the souls in purgatory. 

I adore the sacred wound in thy side ; and, by it, I 
commend to thy goodness our mother the holy Church ; 
by it, also, I supplicate thy mercy for myself. 

O Jesus ! let me enter into thy open side, penetrate 
to thy divine heart, establish myself therein by a 
sincere love and dwell in it for ever. 

(See Resumes, page 409.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 331 

FIFTY-SIXTH MEDITATION. 
JESUS IS TAKEN DOWN FROM THE CROSS. 



"Taking him down from the cross, they laid him in a 
sepulchre." — Acts, xiii. 29. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Jesus, the author of life, has voluntarily suffered on 
the cross the most cruel death, and consummated the 
great mystery of our redemption ; his heart has been 
subsequently run through with a lance, and the last 
drops of his divine blood have been shed on the ground, 
henceforth hallowed. 

Christian souls, let us transport ourselves to the 
mountain of the great Sacrifice, to the altar whereon 
the Lamb that was slain remains motionless ! there is 
Mary, the august Mother of our generous Redeemer, 
adoring the holy Victim and offering him up to the 
heavenly Father, in sentiments of the most lively sorrow 
and the greatest love ! there are the angels forming a 
train of glory round the sacred body still fastened to the 
cross, and paying it the homage of their adoration ; 
there are the beloved disciple and the holy women, who 
cannot leave the divine Crucified, sole object of their 
love. 

Meanwhile the day is drawing to a close ; the 
moment is coming when the body of the divine Master 



33.2 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

must be buried, so that it may not be taken from the 
cross by his enemies and ignominiously cast into the 
grave with the two thieves. 

Ah ! let us not fear. No, no, that immaculate flesh 
shall not be confounded with the bodies of sinners ; for 
it must know no corruption, not even by contact. God 
who will glorify it as much as it has been humbled, in- 
spires Joseph of Arimathoa, a just man and a secret 
disciple of the Savior, to go boldly to Pilate and a*k 
him for the body of Jesus. He also inspires Nicodemus, 
another secret disciple, to join him in rendering the 
sacred duty of sepulture to the august Victim. 

Let us contemplate them arriving at the cross, put- 
ting up ladders, taking down with the greatest respect 
the body of their Master and their God. 

Oh ! who could tell what passes at this moment in the 
soul of the Most Blessed Virgin Mary ! Who could 
imagine her sorrow when she receives in her arms the 
inanimate body of her Divine Son, when she presses it 
to her bosom, contemplates the closed eyes, his livid lips, 
his pallid face, his bloody brow ! . . . 

O Mary, he whom thou dost clasp in thine arms is 
thy Son, Jesus, the fairest of the children of men : but, 
alas ! he is no longer to be known ; he is now in the 
state to which our sins have reduced him. 

Yes, behold him as sin has made him ! 

O good Mother ! by the sorrows thou didst feel at the 
foot of the cross, deign to solicit our pardon from the 
God we have offended ; offer for our sins the Victim 
of salvation, who is in thine arms, and by whom 
alone we can hope to obtain mercy ! 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 333 

Having contemplated Mary weeping over the body of 
Jesus taken down from the cross, and having besought 
her to intercede for us with God, let us testify to her the 
part we take in her sorrows; and also like her, like St. 
John and the holy women, let us adore the divine body 
that was crucified for us. 

Let us unite with the beloved disciple who presses 
that sacred body in his arms, rests his virginal head 
once again on that bosom, the sanctuary of infinite love, 
on which he had leaned the evening before, at supper ; 
let us unite with Magdalen, who waters with her tears 
those divine feet near which she had found peace, and 
which she sees so horribly mangled; let us unite with 
all the pious persons present at the mournful ceremony 
of the taking down from the cross, and who are all eager 
to testify their respect for the sacred flesh of the Man- 
God, and to manifest their grief for his cruel and 
ignominious death. 

Christian souls, let us excite in our hearts the same 
sentiments ; let us prostrate ourselves before the inani- 
mate body of our Redeemer, and let our eyes shed 
torrents of tears. 

Let us also consider, in thought, the Savior's cross 
after the body had been taken down from it ; let us pay 
the homage of our veneration to that precious wood. 

Ah ! it is no longer infamous wood, an instrument of 
torture ; it is a glorious trophy, it is the sign of salva- 
tion ; it is that victorious standard planted on the summit 
of Calvary, which shall become the object of the 
profound veneration of the faithful from age to age for 
evermore. 



334 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

O holy cross, sacred tree, receive the homage of our 
respect ! Although bereft of the adorable body of 
Jesus, thou art and shalt ever be the altar whereon is 
offered the Victim of our salvation ; the balance wherein 
the weight of his divine body far outweighed the sins of 
the world ! and on thee it was, O holy cross, that the price 
of our redemption was laid. down and accepted ! Appar- 
ently a despicable instrument, thou art in reality a 
terrible weapon, since by thee the prince of darkness 
was vanquished and his prey snatched from him. 

Hail, O glorious monument of the victory of the 
King of kings ! the scentre he shall have in his almighty 
hand at the last day ! I prostrate myself before thee, 
contemplating the blood wherewith thou art reddened. 
Ah ! at that sight I feel love and confidence reviving 
within my heart, and I cry out with the Church : " Hail, 
cross ! my only hope."* 

APPLICATION. 

Let us enter into the spirit of the mystery we have 
contemplated — we Christians, who really possess upon 
our altars the sacred body of our divine Savior ; let us 
pay it the homage due to it ; let us keep ourselves in 
its adorable presence with the most religious respect, 
and in the sentiments of love and sorrow wherewith the 
pious persons who took part in his sepulture on Calvary 
were penetrated. 

Let us often think of the sorrows of Mary at the foot, 
of the cross, and especially of those she experienced 
when she received into her arms the inanimate body of 
* Hymn Verilla Regit. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 335 

her divine Son. Ah ! through the love we have for her, 
let us compassionate what she suffered then, and espec- 
ially deplore sin which is its cause. 

Let us venerate with all our heart the holy cross on 
which our divine Redeemer immolated himself, and 
whose image is everywhere under our eyes ; let us 
often look upon it, remembering the great mystery there 
accomplished ; let us excite in our hearts sentiments of 
the most lively confidence in the grace which Jesus 
merited for us by his sufferings and death. 

Let us kiss with the most profound, the most reli- 
gious respect, the particle of the true Cross which the 
Church presents to our veneration ; and form then 
interior acts of regret for our faults, and of love and 
gratitude to him who has loved us so far as to consent to 
sacrifice himself for our salvation. 

PRAYER. 

Yes, O Jesus ! I will venerate thy cross, that sacred 
wood stained with thy blood — thy cross which, having 
become the book of Christians, speaks so eloquently to 
us of thy love and of thine infinite and generous 
charity. 

But, in venerating it, I will weep, my God ! over 
sin which made thine immolation necessary ; over sin 
which crucified thee, and which was also the sole 
cause of the sorrows that broke the heart of thy divine 
Mother. 

I will weep, but I will also hope, because thy cross is 
the sign of hope. Ah ! it tells me that thou hast re- 
deemed me, that I am no longer a slave, that my chains 



336 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

are broken, my shame wiped away, my freedom re- 
gained, my rights recovered ; that I have become a 
ehild of God and heir of Heaven. 

Ah ! it tells me that even I, miserable sinner, but 
justified through it, am allowed to draw near thy sacred 
flesh, to receive thy divine body in the sentiments 
wherewith it was received by the holy personages who 
conveyed it from the cross to the sepulchre ; to place it 
myself in my heart, as in a tomb prepared for its recep- 
tion ; and where it will deposit the germ of life and of 
resurrection that is in it. 

O Mary ! we conjure thee, by thy sorrows, and by 
the sentiments with which thou didst receive into thine 
arms the lifeless body of thy divine Son ! obtain for us 
all the purity, piety, and love wherewith we ought to 
approach that sacred body, to the end that it may be 
really for us the Victim of our salvation, and that his 
death may give us life. 

(See Resumes, page 409.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 337 

FIFTY-SEVENTH MEDITATION. 
JESUS IS LAID IN THE TOMB. 



"They laid him in a sepulchre that was hewed in stone, 
wherein never yet any man had been laid." — St. Luke, 
•xxiii. 53. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us go again to Calvary, O Christian souls ! let us 
go to pay the last duties to the august Victim of our 
redemption. Let us unite with the holy persons who 
are performing that sad and pious ceremony; like 
them, let us show our respect for that sacred body ; 
or rather, like them, let us adore it, because, even in 
death, the plenitude of divinity therein abides. 

Let us contemplate the body of Jesus taken down from 
the cross — placed in the arms of Mary, the Mother of 
sorrows — watered with the tears of the beloved disciple 
and Magdalene — then stretched on the ground which is 
reddened with his blood. 

There Joseph and Nicodemus kiss it respectfully, and 
discover, alas ! the innumerable wounds which the 
blood concealed from their eyes : they embalm it with 
myrrh and aloes, and wrap it up in a long white veil. 

Let us behold them afterwards taking in their arms 
that precious burden, going away from the cross, and walk- 
ing towards the garden where the sepulchre, destined to 
receive it, has been hewn in the rock. 



338 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

Oh ! with what lively emotion should the sight of that 
mournfnl ceremony inspire us ! Mary follows the body 
of her divine Son, from whom her maternal heart can- 
not separate ; with her are the beloved disciple, Mag- 
dalen, and the other holy women, whose tears flow 
unceasingly. 

Let us contemplate them, and behold also with the 
eyes of faith the angels who surround and adore the 
body of the Word of God — of him by whom all was made 
— and who now, at the close of the sixth day of the great 
week, has finished the work of the new creation, and is 
going to rest in the tomb, whence he is soon to go forth 
glorious. 

The pious cortege has arrived at the sepulchre ; the 
sacred remains of the Savior are religiously placed 
therein ; there the persons who have assisted at the 
burial again prostrate themselves, profoundly adoring 
it and shedding floods of tears ; they then retire from 
the cave which is closed with a great- stone. 

Oh ! who can describe the sentiments wherewith 
their hearts are penetrated ! How profound is their 
grief ! how bitter their regret ! . . . 

O Mary, what anguish of soul is thine ! But thou 
who wert so blessed for having believed * — is not thy 
grief tempered by thy hope ? Yes, dry up thy tears, 
desolate Mother, for thy Son is about to be restored to 
thee ; the tomb shall not long retain his sacred remains ; 
and in spite of the precautions of the Jews, in spite of 
the power of hell, his word shall be accomplished, and 
thou shalt soon see him again living and glorious. 
* St. Luke. i. 45. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 339 

you Christian souls who assist in thought at the 
sepulture of the divine Savior, at that ceremony so 
touching, so fit to excite in our hearts the most lively 
emotion, reflect on what constitutes more especially the 
spirit of the mystery you contemplate ; consider, above 
all, the motives from which our adorable Master would 
have his body buried and made to dwell in the tomb ! 

Behold some of these which first present themselves 
to our meditation : — 

Our Lord Jesus Christ would be buried and remain 
in the tomb : — 1st : In order to leave no doubt as to the 
reality of his death, and, consequently, of his resurrec- 
tion. 2d : To verify the prophecy of Isaiah, saying that 
his sepulchre should be glorious ;* and also to accomplish 
what was prefigured by Joseph in prison, by Jonas in the 
whale's belly, by Daniel in the lion's den. 3d : To make 
himself in all, except sin, like unto us, and to participate 
in the humiliation of the tomb. 4th : To engage us to 
resign ourselves to that inevitable humiliation, to make it 
less formidable to us, to lead us even to desire it. 

Let us pause a moment on this last thought : — Jesus 
being God, elevates, sanctifies, makes every state through 
which he passes even desirable to Christians, his imi- 
tators. In his train, there is no longer anything that 
is really humiliating ; the cross itself becomes the sign 
of glory ; so it is with the tomb since our divine 
Master deigned to descend into it. It is no longer an 
object of horror for Christians, but rather a place of 
rest, into which they enter after the warfare of this 
life, in the train of their august chief, and sleep there 
t Tsa., \i. 10. 



340 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

in union with him, awaiting the great day of the 
resurrection. 

The sepulture of our Lord Jesus Christ affords us 
consolation and revives our hope, as it also instructs 
us in a sublime manner in our duties as Christians and 
Religious. 

" Buried with him in baptism,"* says St. Paul ;— 
that is to say that, by that sacrament, we have made 
the solemn egagement to bury ourselves mystically with 
our divine Redeemer, in order to participate in the 
merits of his death and deserve to rise with him. 

The Christian ought, therefore, to be dead to the 
world, separated from the world ; he ought to be able 
to say : " The world is crucified to me, and I to the 
world ;"+ I am, in regard to the world, as would be a 
dead body already laid in the tomb ; my life is hidden 
in God, and like the sacred body of Christ in the 
sepulchre, I have no connection but with God and his 
angels. 

Happy the persons who, detached in mind and heart 
from the world and the things of the world, are mysti- 
cally buried with Jesus Christ ! their soul tastes repose 
in the silence of the passions, . and is encouraged to 
perseverance by the well-founded hope of a glorious 
resurrection. 

APPLICATION. 

If it is obligatory on all Christians to be dead to the 

world and buried with Jesus Christ, it is much more so 

for us Religious, who have solemnly engaged to do so, 

not only in baptism, but also by following our vocation. 

* Coh, ii. 12. f Gal., vi. 14. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 341 

Yes, we have bid adieu to the world ; we are exte- 
riorly separated from it ; we have put on a habit which 
it considers as a shroud : but has our separation been 
equally interior! 

Are we really dead to the world, dead to its vanities, 
its pleasures, its maxims ? Is our life hidden in God 
with Jesus Christ ? Are we burfed with our divine 
Savior ; that is to say, do we abide in recollection and 
religiously observe the silence prescribed for us? 

Supposing that all our brethren acted as we do, would 
our house be an image of the tomb of our Lord Jesus 
Christ ? Would it breathe of that peace and piety 
which should always be met with in religious com- 
munities ? 

Let us, then, enter generously from this day forth on 
the practice of silence and recollection ; let us keep 
ourselves closely united with Jesus in the sepulchre : 
in that union we shall find rest and hope ; and when 
death shall appear before us, we shall accept it with 
resignation and even with joy, in the thought that, by 
it, we shall become still more like unto our divine Head ; 
and that the sojourn of our body in the tomb shall 
terminate, like the sabbath of the great week, with the 
day-dawn of the glorious resurrection. 

PRAYER. 

O Jesus ! my hope and my strength, thou hast called 
me by my baptism, and more especially by my voca- 
tion, to manifest in myself thy life, thy death, thy sepul- 
ture, to the end that I may one day share in thy 
resurrection : I bless thee foi having thus remembered 



342 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

me, and I will try to correspond with all thy designs 
in relation to me. 

Yes, I wish to manifest thy death and burial ; *I wish 
to be buried with thee, to think only of thee and what 
is of thee ; I wish to have no more connection with the 
world which I have so often renounced. But, Lord ! I 
am weak ; wherefore, I implore the assistance of thy 
grace, in order that my good will may not fail, and 
that, closing mine ears to the noise of the world and 
mine eyes to its seductive pomp, I may dwell with 
thee in the tomb of the religious life, so as to share one 
day in the glory of thy resurrection, and live with thee 
that life of happiness that is never to have an end. 

(See Resumes, page 410.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 343 

FIFTY-EIGHTH MEDITATION. 
THE SEPULCHRE OF JESUS CHRIST. 



"His sepulchre shall be glorious." — Isa., xi. 10. 



CONSIDEEATION. 

The tomb is for raan a monument of the most pro- 
found humiliation : there it is that his body, stricken by 
death, is delivered as a prey to corruption, and soon 
presents but a heap of rottenness, — sad object of horror 
and pity. 

But it is not so with the sepulchre of Jesus Christ, 
because his immaculate flesh is always, even after death, 
hypostatically united with the divinity. Hence had he 
said, speaking by the mouth of David : u My flesh shall 
rest in hope ; " Thou wilt not abandon me in the tomb ; 
" Nor wilt thou give thy holy one to see corruption."* 
He had likewise prophesied by Isaiah, that his sepulchre 
should be glorious.t 

And this is what actually happens : it is with the 
sepulchre of Jesus as with his cross ; from a monument 
of humiliation, it becomes, through him, a monument of 
glory which shall be honored by all generations ; which 
nations shaU dispute the honor of possessing ; which the 
* Ps., xv. 9. 10. t Isa., xi. 10. 



344 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

great ones and princes of the earth shall be eager to 
visit ; and to which all nations shall come to pray to him 
who was buried therein. 

Oh ! how glorious is the sepulchre of our divine Savior 
which was for him only a couch whereon he rested 
some hours in the sleep of death, awaiting the moment 
of the resurrection ! Therein was inclosed the true 
Samson, guarded by the new Philistines; and thence it 
was that he went forth, in the middle of the night, 
storming the gates of death, and passing through the 
midst of his terrified enemies. 

Let us go, then, in spirit to that holy Sepulchre ; let 
us honor it as the trophy of the victory of Jesus over 
death ; and, at sight of it, let us open our hearts to hope 
that, Jesus being our Head, it shall be with our tomb as 
with his ; that it shall become glorious on the day when 
the Lord shall raise up for life those who have been united 
with him on this earth ; — those who, faithful to their 
baptismal promises, shall have been dead to the world, 
and buried with that divine Master, — those who, entering 
into the spirit of the mystery of his sepulture, shall 
comprehend the instructions he there gives us and 
endeavor to put them in practice. 

Let us consider, then, Avhat has been revealed to us 
of the Sepulchre of our Lord, to the end that, knowing 
more and more that adorable Model and all-powerful 
Mediator, we may comprehend what we ought to do to 
be like unto him, and merit to be united with him in 
his resurrection. 

Let us remark, first, that this sepulchre belongs to 
Joseph of Arimathea ; that Jesus thus practised poverty 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 345 

in a sublime manner and to the end, — for, even m the 
tomb, he has not where to lay his head.* 

Let us next remark that that sepulchre is not far dis- 
tant from the rock of Calvary — a circumstance which 
makes us remember that it is by the sufferings of the 
cross that the calm repose of christian burial is ob- 
tained, and that he shall sleep in peace with Christ, 
who, by patience and mortification, shall have been 
crucified with him. 

This sepulchre is hewn in the rock : let us learn from 
this that it is by hard and constant labor that we shall 
dispose our hearts to become the dwelling of Jesus Christ. 

That sepulchre is placed in a garden : this circum- 
stance reminds us that the faithful soul, in which Christ 
dwells, ought to be adorned with the flowers of exterior 
virtues ; that it ought to make itself remai'kable by 
an edifying conduct, constantly give good example, and 
diffuse outwardly the odor of the virtues of Jesus 
abiding within. 

That sepulchre is guarded by the enemies of Jesus : 
through precaution, they are placed near, so that no one 
may come to carry off the body enclosed therein ; but, 
as David had foretold, t their precautions are a snare to 
them, because they will only serve to render the resur- 
rection of the divine Savior more evident. 

Ah ! let us well understand, therefore, that all merely 
human wisdom is folly before God ; that men in vain 
oppose the designs of his Providence, for those designs 
are always accomplished, and often by the very means 
employed against them. 

* St. Matt., viii. 20. + Ps.. xxxiv. s. 



346 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

The sepulchre in which it pleases our divine Savior 
to remain is a new one, where there is no corruption, 
nor bones of the dead ; and again it is his will to be 
buried there in a white shroud. Ah ! could he better 
make known to us that he only takes up his abode in a 
heart that is pure and free from the defilement of mortal 
sin? 

But this is not enough : in order that Jesus may be 
pleased with us, he must furthermore find in us all the 
virtues that ought to characterize Christians, and of which 
we are reminded by the circumstances of his sepulture — 
mortification and penance symbolized by the myrrh and 
aloes wherewith his divine body was embalmed — exte- 
rior retreat, recalled by the sealed stone that closes up the 
entrance of the tomb — interior recollection, typified by 
the darkness and silence that reign within the monu- 
ment. He must find there the virtues specially repre- 
sented by the persons who assisted at his burial — the 
justice of Joseph of Arimathea, the generosity of Nicode- 
mus, the penance of Mary Magdalen, the charity of St. 
John, the piety of the holy women : — our heart must be, 
as far as possible, an image of the most holy heart of 
Mary. 

Happy are the persons who present to Jesus this 
train of honor ! Happy the heart adorned with these 
virtues and these perfections ! That heart is the sepul- 
chre wherein Jesus is buried, where he dwells, where he 
deposits the germ of life glorious and eternal. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 347 

APPLICATION. 

Very different from the Jews — who keep near the holy 
Sepulchre for the purpose of gainsaying Jesus — let us 
remain there with the desire of glorifying that divine 
Savior. 

Let us beseech him to come and dwell in us, to take 
up his abode there and deposit the germ of life everlast- 
ing, which he merited for us by his sufferings and death. 
But let us endeavor to prepare for him a dwelling worthy 
of him, by advancing more and more in the practice of 
the Christian virtues, recalled to our mind by the cir- 
cumstances of his burial. 

Yes, let Jesus find in us the myrrh of mortification, 
the flowers of modesty, the white shroud of purity ; let 
our heart be like the rock, solidly established in faith 
and charity ; let it be new, or exempt from all affections 
other than the love of Jesus ; let us by the practice of 
retreat and silence, close it to every report and to 
every spectacle from without ; let our recollection be for 
our soid the sealed stone placed at the entrance of the 
sepulchre, or yet the vigilant guard who forbids access 
thereto. 

Let us enter into these dispositions, especially when 
we have the happiness of going to holy Communion. 
Let us remember that the Eucharist is the mystic sep- 
ulchre of Jesus Christ, continuing through all ages 
of the Church, and in which all the faithful are called 
to participate. Let us go often in spirit to the Savior's 
sepulchre ; and there let us shut ourselves up with him, 
close our ears to all noise coming from without, dwell 



348 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

in silent contemplation, and allow our soul to be inspired 
with the most ineffable sentiments of regret, pity, love, 
and gratitude. 

PRAYER, 

O Jesus ! thou dost permit thy sepulchre to be my 
refuge ; there it is that my soid delights in thy holy com- 
pany, and far from all worldly noise ; there it is that it 
finds thee, my beloved ! thou who art my Lord and 
my God, and the source of the glorious life to which 1 
aspire ! 

Amiable Redeemer ! who to make us sharers in thy 
sepulture, dost continue it mystically in the Holy 
Eucharist, and permittest me to receive thee so often 
into my heart ! grant, therefore, I beseech thee, that 
1 may communicate with all the dispositions thou 
demandest of me, and which thou hast made known to 
me during this meditation, to the end that thou mayst 
be pleased with the sepulchre of my heart, and that thou 
mayst deposit therein the germ of glorious resur- 
rection and of eternal life which is in thee. 

(See Reumes, page 410.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 349 

FIFTY-NINTH MEDITATION. 
THE RESURRECTION OF JESUS CHRIST. 



You seek Jesus who was crucified: he is not here; for he is 
risen. " — St. Matt., xxviii. 5, 6. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Jesus, our beloved Savior, has been crucified ; we 
have seen him suffer every pain ; we have contemplated 
him dead, his heart pierced with a lance ; we then 
considered him in the arms of his holy and afflicted 
Mother, and, finally, in the sepulchre around which his 
enemies keep watch. 

Oh ! to what a state is the infant Church reduced at 
this moment ! Its supreme Head is dead and buried ; 
the apostles and other disciples, sad and discouraged, 
hide themselves and think of dispersing ; the holy 
society they are called to found appears ruined, annihi- 
lated ; the enemies of Jesus triumph ; they boast of 
having put to death him whose wisdom and power 
excited their envy. 

Nevertheless, their joy is not without uneasiness : 
they, in fact, remember that, asking of Jesus a prodigy 
in proof of his divinity, he had told them that he 
would accomplish what had been prefigured by the 
prophet Jonas,* and would rise the third day after his 
* Pb., xxxiv. 8: CXl. 10. 



350 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

death. Now that third day is not yet past : they are 
therefore afraid ; hence it is that they carefully guard 
the sepulchre, which they have closed with a large stone 
and sealed with the seals of the nation. 

But what can they do against the Almighty ! What is 
the use though of that sealed stone which closes the 
entrance of the tomb, and of those armed people who are 
placed around it, if not to render more incontestable the 
fact, the accomplishment of which they so much dread ? 
Their precautions are snares to themselves : " They fall 
into their own nets," as the prophet had foretold. 

The divine body of Jesus reposes in the tomb, -whilst 
his most holy soul, going down into Limbo, consoles the 
just of the Old Law, announces to them their speedy 
deliverance, and no doubt, gives as a sign thereof, the 
resurrection which he is about to effect by the power of 
the Word to which it is united, in returning to re-animate 
the sacred body from which it was separated by death. 

Christian souls ! let us transport ourselves in thought 
to the Savior's tomb, at the moment when the day of 
rest is drawing to an end, and that third day so anx- 
iously expected, is about to begin ; let us adore that sacred 
body motionless in death, wrapped in a shroud, and 
covered with spices, as though it had been necessary to 
preserve it from corruption. 

But, behold ! the moment has arrived. The soul of 
Jesus penetrates into the sepulchre ; it unites with its 
body ; it restores to it feeling, color, beauty, strength, 
and motion ; and, resuming again the life he had quitted, 
he frees himself from the bonds and grave-clothes in 
which he is wrapped, and goes forth from the tomb 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 351 

without removing the stone that closed the entrance, or 
breaking the seals affixed thereto. 

O miracles of miracles ! happy night during which 
it is wrought ! night whereof it is said that it is brighter 
than the day ! Jesus goes forth from the tomb, and he 
goes forth living and glorious ! He snatches himself 
from the arms of frightened death, — he breaks the liga- 
ments wherein it binds him, — and. manifests that he is 
truly the Son of God. Oh ! how the designs of his 
enemies are confounded, and the projects of hell 
defeated ! 

He who was covered with wounds, fastened to the 
cross, drained of blood — behold him now full of life and 
beauty ; his body, which resembled that of a leper, has 
put on eternal youth j and it is become more luminous 
than the light itself. For him, the cross is changed 
into a sceptre — Calvary into a scene of glory — the tomb 
into a monument of triumph. The great fact of the 
resurrection is accomplished ; a new creation is effected ; 
the Holy Church is about to dry her tears and partici- 
pate in the glory of her Divine Spouse. 

Already the holy women hasten to the sepulchre, 
whither the apostles will also go : they see that the 
stone which closed its entrance is thrown down ; they 
draw near, and all at once an angel appears to them, 
and announces the great event of the Savior's resurrec- 
tion : " Fear not," said he to them ; " you seek Jesus 
who was crucified ; he is not here ; he is risen ! " 

Yes, Jesus is risen ! the angels proclaim it, and every 
thing shows that it is so : the tomb is empty — the body 
that had been laid there and guarded so carefully, is no 



352 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

longer there ; the grave-clothes are still there, but folded 
as if they had not been used. There is no trace of 
death ; it breathes, on the contrary, of immortality : 
there, hearts are renewed in hope ! there, souls are illu- 
mined with the light of faith, and depart, persuaded of the 
resurrection, and, consequently, of the divinity <>f our 
Lord. . . Ah ! how sweet it is for ns to give way to the 
thoughts and feelings inspired by faith in that mystery! 

Jesus is risen: he is, therefore, God; his doctrine is, 
therefore, divine, his Church divine, his promises divine; 
it is, therefore, true that the work of our redemption is 
accomplished, that the chains of our slavery are broken, 
that the Victim of Calvary was really the Victim of our 
salvation; it is, therefore, true that sin is destroyed, 
that the sting of death is broken, that the hope of eter- 
nal happiness is restored to us, and that we are recon- 
ciled with heaven: that joy succeeds, therefore, to sad- 
ness and overflows all hearts! 

In dying on Calvary, Jesus, as a victim, gave his life 
to satisfy the sentence which condemned man to death; 
and in rising again, he has taken a new life which he 
communicates to us all, who are his children. Ah ! let 
us receive that life with the greatest joy and the live- 
liest gratitude ! 

Jesus is risen ; but he is our Head : we shall, then, 
rise again, we who are his members : all of us may, 
then, say those words of Job: "I know that my 
Redeemer liveth, and in the last day I shall rise out of 
the earth ; I shall see my God."* Oh ! how well this 
thought is calculated to console us for the necessity of 
* Job. xix. 25, 26. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHEIST. 353 

dying ! The tomb is for the faithful who are united with 
Jesus, only a place of rest where they sleep some time in 
death, but whence, like him and by him, they shall go 
forth living and glorious. 

APPLICATION. 

Let the firmest hope animate our hearts. Yes ! let 
us have confidence ; our Head has triumphed, we shall 
triumph with him ; the sting of death shall be broken 
for us, and the aurora of the glorious resurrection 
shall thine on our eyes. 

But let us often call to mind that it was necessary 
that Christ should suffer, and so enter into his glory ;* 
and that it is by our likeness to him, we shall merit 
being united with him in his resurrection. 

Let our souls be inspired with the greatest joy at 
the contemplation of Jesus risen; let us celebrate his 
triumph, let us sing sacred hymns to his glory ; let us 
testify to him, by our eagerness in his service, and 
especially by our fidelity to his graces, all our gratitude 
for the new life he communicates to us. Let us love 
with our whole heart that tender Father the new Adam, 
who regenerates humanity, more than repairs all 
the evil of the first sin, and permits the Church to ex- 
claim : " happy fault which procured for us such a 
Redeemer ! "t 

Let us beseech Jesus risen to visit our soul, to bless 
it, to give it peace, and help to preserve that life of 
grace which he communicates to it, and which is one 
day to become the life of heavenly glory. 

* St. Luke, xxiv. 26. > Hymn, Exultet. 



354 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

PRAYER. 

Jesus, all-powerful conqueror, destroyer of sin, 
death and hell! thou who by thy resurrection dost triumph 
over thine enemies ! thou art subdued by death only to 
subdue it, to destroy it, and to give us strength and 
courage also to triumph over it. Thou openest to us, O 
Lord ! by this victory so complete and so glorious, the 
gates of eternal life which our sins had closed against 
us; and thou inspirest us with the liveliest sentiments of 
joy, hope, and love. 

But since it is thou, Jesus, who inspirest us with 
these sentiments ! sustain them, make them lasting in us, 
to the end that, profiting by the new life thou givest us, 
we may render ourselves worthy of the eternal life 
which is its consummation, and which thou wilt com- 
municate to all those who, on this earth, shall have 
been united in thy sufferings and in thy death. 

(See Resumes, page 411.) 



OF OUR LOED JESUS CHRIST. 355 

SIXTIETH MEDITATION: 
GOOD FRIDAY. 



The just perisheth, and no man layeth it to heart. "- 
Isa., lvii. 1. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Behold the day on which the great Sacrifice is 
accomplished, the debt of guilty humanity paid, divine 
justice satisfied, earth made holy, hell vanquished and 
chained, — the day on which we became, at the foot of 
the cross, children of Mary and heirs of heaven. 

Oh ! what moments of that day, as well as of the night 
which preceded it, can the faithful contemplate, without 
being penetrated with the liveliest emotion and shedding 
abundant tears of compassion, of regret, of love, of 
gratitude ? 

The previous night is that ever memorable one on 
winch Jesus gave himself to us in his sacrament — on 
which he commenced his passion in Gethsemane by the 
free shedding of his blood — on which he afterwards gave 
himself up to his enemies, and appeared before Annas, 
and for the first time, before Caiaphas. 

When the day dawns Jesus is in a narrow cell ; he 
goes forth therefrom to be brought before the great 
council of the Jews, which delivers him to Pilate ; Pilate 
sends him to Herod, who, in his turn, sends him back 



356 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

to him. For three hours, the adorable Victim is thus 
dragged from one tribunal to another, every where 
loaded with ignominy, and continually receiving the 
most shameful "and the most revolting usage. 

Then come the new interrogations of Pilate, the 
clamors of the Jews, the preference given to Barabbas, 
the scourging, the crowning with thorns, the condemn- 
ing to death, the carrying of the cross, the crucifixion ; 
then the three hours' agony on the cross, with all that 
takes place on Calvary from the moment when Jesus 
prays for those who crucify him till that when, uttering 
a great cry, he bows his head and expires; and even 
till that when his body, after being taken down from the 
cross and placed in Mary's arms, is wrapped in a 
winding-sheet and borne to the tomb. 

No, no ! there is not a moment of this day which does 
not present to the Christian soul a subject of the most 
salutary reflections. Nevertheless, let us not pause on 
each in particular ; but, from a general point of view, 
consider the principal virtues of which Jesus to-day gives 
us the example. Adorable Master ! he successively 
establishes his pulpit in the house of Caiaphas, in the 
streets of Jerusalem, in the pretorium, on Calvary ; and 
every where he teaches charity, patience, obedience, 
humility, and generosity ! 

And first charity.— He sacrifices himself, that all may 
know that he loves his Father, and that he does what 
his Father has commanded him ;* he sacrifices himself, 
that we may know how much he has loved us : it is his 
love for his Father and for us that conducts him to 
Calvary and fastens him to the cross. 
* St. John. xiv. 31. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 357 



that a man lay down his life for his friends."* Now, 
this is what he has done for all of us on this day which 
the Church commemorates ; so each of us may say with 
St. Paul : " Jesus loved me, and delivered himself for 
me."t 

Yes, Jesus loved us even to the shedding of all his 
blood for our salvation ! Ah ! could we, then, hesitate 
still to love him and to devote ourselves unreservedly 
to him ? Nor either could we hut devote ourselves to 
our neighbor, whosoever he be, since our neighbor repre- 
sents, in regard to us, Jesus Christ himself ; and, on the 
other hand, that divine Savior has said : " Love one 
another as I have loved you."! 

During the whole course of his passion, Jesus teaches, 
by his example, patience and meekness. Lion of the 
tribe of Juda,§ wielding the very might of Grod, having 
but to will it to bring down from heaven " more tlian 
twelve legions of angels," || or rather, to annihilate his 
enemies — that very moment, he appeared only " dumb 
as a lamb before his shearer ; "^[ he leaves all power to 
the empire of darkness ; he wishes to be only a " man of 
sorrows, and acquainted with infirmity."** 

His enemies exhaust their rage upon him ; and he 
bears it without complaining, and regarding them only 
with looks of kindness, of tenderness, and of love ! 

He even teaches virtue of obedience in the most 
sublime manner. He renounces his own will to do the 

* St. John, xv. 13. t Gal., ii. 20. J St. John, xiii. 34. 

§ Apoc, v. 5. || St. Matt., xxvi. 53. If Isa., liii. 7. 

** Ibid., 3. 



358 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

will of his Father, and accepts the chalice that is offered 
to him. He fulfils exactly all that which had been writ- 
ten of him in the holy books, and can cry out before he 
dies : " All is consummated."* He has obeyed in all 
that was commanded him; he has obeyed all, even his 
executioners ; he has sacrificed his rest, his honor, his 
life, to obedience. " He humbled himself," says St. 
Paul, " becoming obedient unto death, even the death 
of the cross."t What a model for Christians, and still 
more for Religious ! 

To what a degree that adorable Master carries the 
practice of humility ! 

Most high God ! King of Kings ! he debases himself, 
taking the form of a servant.f He had said by David : 
11 1 am a worm, and no man ; the reproach of men, and 
the outcast of the people ; all they that saw me have 
laughed me to scorn."^ Now, in his passion, each of 
these sayings has its fulfilment. The Son of Grod co- 
equal with his Father, worthy the adoration of heaven 
and earth, he is " reputed with the wicked,"|| placed 
below Barabbas, abandoned to all contempt. The Holy 
of holies, he appears as a wretched criminal who is 
covered with ignominy, and delivered over to the most 
infamous death ! . . . 

And what generosity is his ! 

He sacrifices himself for us who were his enemies. 
Whilst his executioners crucify him, he prays for them 
to his heavenly Father. He offers up, to obtain their 
pardon, that cross on which he is nailed, that blood 

* St. John, xix. 30. t Phil., ii. 8. J Ibid., 6, 7. 

§ Ps., xxi. 7, 8. || Tsa., liii. 12. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 359 

which they cause to flow from his veins. At the very 
moment of his greatest pains, he forgets himself to at- 
tend to us — he gives us, from his cross, Mary for our 
Mother — and after he has expired, he will still shed 
upon us, from his open heart, the greatest treasures of 
his grace. 

Behold, Christian souls, what a model is to-day 
"shewn us in the mount."* Happy are they who 
make it their whole study to become like unto 
him ! 

APPLICATION. 

Let us adore, from the bottom of our heart, Jesus 
immolating himself for us. Prostrate at the foot of his 
cross, let us weep over his sorrows, in union with his 
most holy Mother, and renew towards him our senti- 
ments of love and gratitude. Let us give ourselves to 
him and for ever. Has he not purchased us at a 
price dear enough 1 How, then, could we think of 
withholding ourselves from him ? 

Let us weep over our sins, the true cause of his suf- 
ferings and death, and take the resolution to commit 
them no more. 

Let us take from our hearts all resentments, all 
antipathy : to-day is the great day of God's mercies to 
us ; why should it not be the day of pardon for all the 
injuries that may have been done us ? When Jesus 
prays for his executioners, could it be that there would 
be Christians whose hearts would remain closed against 
the love of their brethren ? 

* Exod., xxv. 40. 



360 MEDITATIONS OX THE PASSION 

" Jesus sacrificed on the tree of the cross," says St.- 
Bernard, " is the cause, the motive, the model of all our 
sacrifices." Let us unite ourselves to him more and 
more, and draw from that union strength and courage 
to walk in his footsteps. Let us labor, by his grace, to 
die to ourselves, to our self-love, to our passions. He 
wills it so, and besides, nothing is more advantageous to us; 
for this mystical death produces the true life, and makes 
us participators in all the wealth he has acquired for us 
by his sufferings and death. 

PRAYER. 

O Jesus, Author of life, who diest to-day to save me 
from eternal death, deign to apply to me the merits of 
thine immolation ! Grant that, weeping over thy sor- 
rows and my sins, I may persevere in the closest union 
with thee, and so obtain the salvation thou hast merited 
for me ! Amen. 

(See Resumes, page 61, 2d subject.) 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 861 

SIXTY-FIRST MEDITATION. 
HOLY SATURDAY. 



He rested on the seventh day." — Gen., ii. 2. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us meditate on the repose of Jesus in the 
sepulchre. Ah ! Avhat other subject could we choose to- 
day that would be more conformable to the spirit of the 
Church, and present more salutary instruction. 

Let us go to the tomb of the divine Savior ; let us 
enter there with sentiments of the most affectionate 
piety ; let us consider that divine body given up for 
yet another day to the power of death $ let us contem- 
plate that motionless head, that pallid face, those closed 
eyelids, that brow bearing the print of the thorns 
wherewith it was crowned, those pierced hands and 
feet, that open side, that wounded heart ; and let us 
recall what our adorable Redeemer suffered for our 
salvation. 

Let us adore him in his rest, which was preceded by 
so much toil and patience. O Jesus ! thou art that 
generous workman who, from the first hour to the last, 
bore the whole burden and heat of the day. Thou hast 
watered with thy sweat and thy blood the furrow thou 
didst dig. Thou hast closed thy career, finished thy 
. .. 16, , '. 



362 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

task. Yes, thy mission is fulfilled: divine justice is 
satisfied ; sin expiated and repaired ; the Church 
founded ; humanity regenerated ; hell vanquished ; 
heaven opened. 

Yesterday thou didst tell us from the height of thy 
cross : " All is consummated ! "* It only remained for 
thee to enter into thy rest, where thou dost, neverthe- 
less, continue still thy work of salvation, and whence 
thou ceasest not to instruct us. 

Jesus in the sepulchre honors his Father resting on 
the seventh day. t He has just finished the new creation : 
like his Father, he has considered the work he has 
accomplished, and saw that it was all good ; J then, 
ceasing from his dolorous labor, he would rest on this 
seventh day § of the great week, — a mysterious rest 
which had been prefigured, and is full of instruction 
for us. 

The repose of Jesus on the cross or in the tomb, had 
been prefigured by the sleep of the first man in the ter- 
restrial paradise. Jesus is the new Adam : scarcely is 
he sleeping the sleep of death when, from his open side, 
flow forth the blood and water which are to form the 
Church, his most holy Spouse, the mother of the living. 

This repose of Jesus had been prefigured by the 
captivity of the patriarch Joseph, who passes suddenly 
from a prison to the steps of a throne, from chains to 
the height of glory, and who hears himself called the 
Savior of the world. 

It had been prefigured by the sleep of Samson, in the 
city of Gaza. Jesus, the true Samson, the Mighty One, 

* St. John, xix. 30. t Gen., ii, 2. { Ibid., i, 31. 

S Ibid., ii. 2. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 363 

the Wonderful, is in the sepulchre surrounded by guards 
who keep watch over him ; but the moment is at hand 
when he shall bear away the gates of the city of death, 
and pass with them through the midst of his terrified 
enemies. 

The repose of Jesus in the tomb had been prefigured 
by the stay of Jonas in the belly of the whale, whence 
that prophet was to go forth alive, in order to bear to 
the Ninevites the word that was to be their salvation. 
It had also been prefigured by the stay of Daniel in the 
lion's den, whence that man of wonders went forth safe 
and sound, to the confusion of his enemies, who are 
cast in and meet their death there. 

Jesus rests in the sepulchre, to celebrate the last sab- 
bath of the Mosaic law as he had celebrated, at the 
supper, its last Pasch. That rest is only a figure of 
that whereon he shall enter to-morrow by his resur- 
rection : hence that morrow is the first day of the week 
which shall be henceforth the day of the Lord, the 
Sabbath of the new law. 

Jesus rests. , . Nevertheless, he is not without 
acting : his body is, indeed, here motionless ; but his 
soul is in Limbo consoling the just of the. Old Law, 
making them taste, by his presence, the happiness they 
shall soon enjoy with him and through him in heaven. 

Neither is he without acting in this world where, by 
his grace, he enlightens, strengthens, consoles his 
disciples, — where, by his providence, he regulates all so 
as to baffle the desires of his enemies, to whom their 
precautions shall be a snare.* 

Jesus rests in death ; but he is our Head, — we all rest 
* Ps.. xxxiv. 8. 



oi>4 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

there with him. The sepulture is only the seventh-day 
rest ; for Christians who, having accomplished the work 
for which they were placed on this earth, can at this last 
hour say with truth, "All is consummated :" — yes, death 
is for them but a sleep of hope. Like Jesus in the tomb, 
they are in peace, awaiting the dawn of the great day, 
which shall be a day of never-ending glory and 
happiness. 

APPLICATION. 

Let us adore in the sepulchre the divine body which 
was laid therein by the piety of Joseph of Arimathea, 
and Nicodemus. Let us honor the repose of Jesus 
sleeping in the arms of death, awaiting the hour for 
breaking the chains that bind him. 

There is a repose figurative of that on which he is to 
enter by his resurrection, and which he has merited 
by his toils and sufferings. 

Good shepherd ! he has come to us wandering sheep ; 
he tired himself out seeking us, taking us in his arms, 
carrying us back to the fold . . . 

Master, come doAvn from heaven to teach us — he has 
every where announced his holy Avord, he has called all 
nations to him ; and now he rests close by his cross, the 
sublime pulpit from which he gave men his last 
instructions. 

God, his Father, rested after having finished the 
creation ; so does our divine Savior rest to-day, after 
having accomplished the work of our redemption, and 
shed on the earth the last drop of his blood. 

Let us honor his burial on Calvary by the liveliest, 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 365 

the most affectionate devotion to the Eucharist which is, 
in fact, his mystical sepulture. Let us fix our eyes upon 
the holy tabernacle, and think of the treasure inclosed 
within it. Under the veils of the sacramental species 
is really the sacred body of our divine Master ; — 
that same body that was taken down from the cross, 
wrapped in a white shroud and placed in the sepulchre 
whence it afterwards arose glorious. 

Let us adore him with the deepest and most affec- 
tionate piety, and devote ourselves unreservedly to him 
by our love and our gratitude. 

Let us think that our heart is, likewise, the sepulchre 
of Jesus Christ on the days when we have the happiness 
of receiving holy communion. Oh ! let us carefully 
prepare it for him, to the end that he may fill it with the 
perfume of his divinity, and that he may plant therein 
and develop the germ of life eternal. 

To-morrow that divine Savior is coming to us. Ah ! let 
our soul be then, as far as possible, a fitting resting-place 
for him — a tabernacle resplendent with the gold of 
charity, and adorned with the flowers of purity, humility, 
and piety. 

Let us honor the sepulture of Jesus Christ, by the 
exterior and interior retirement we ought to observe in 
our state. As Religious, let us remember that we have 
quitted the world, that we are dead to the world and 
buried with Jesus Christ : let us, then, place our whole 
delight in dwelling with that admirable Master, in 
keeping ourselves in his holy presence, in visiting him 
in his sacrament, in living with him and for him. 

Happy are they who observe this conduct! united 



366 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

with Jesus Christ, the first-born from the dead,* and the 
Author of life, they apply to themselves the fruits of 
sanctifying redemption, they accomplish works sanctify- 
ing and meritorious for eternity ; and when the day shall 
come that will end their labors here below, they shall 
sleep in peace the death of the just — resting in the hope 
of living again for glory, at the great day of the general 
resurrection. 

PRAYER. 

Jesus ! divine Host immolated for us on the cross, 
and inclosed within our holy tabernacles, I honor, in union 
with thy most holy Mother, thy death and burial, and 
I beseech thee to apply to me the merits thereof! 

Grant, by thy grace, that, dying to the world and 
my passions, to live only by thee, with thee, and for 
thee, I may render myself worthy to rise in glory, and 
to go to celebrate in heaven, with the angels and saints, 
thy triumph over death and hell ! 

(See Resumes, page 62, 2d subject.) 



* Col., i. 18. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. • 367 

SIXTY-SECOM) MEDITATION. 
MAY 3rd.— FINDING OF THE HOLY CROSS. 



" Blessed is the wood by which justice cometh."- 
Wisd., xiv. 7. 



CONSIDERATION. 

Let us call to mind the event which the Church 
commemorates to-day, and which is so consoling to the 
piety of the faithful. 

St. Helena, visiting the places consecrated by the 
presence of Jesus Christ in his mortal life, orders search 
to be made for the True Cross and the other instruments 
of the passion. Excavations are made on Calvary, and 
the Savior's Cross is discovered, as also those of the 
thieves who were put to death with him. By a striking 
miracle it is soon distinguished from the latter, and be- 
comes the object of the veneration which was its due. 

Let us lovingly pay it that homage so efficacious in 
fruits of sanctifi cation ; and to dispose ourselves for 
embracing the practice thereof, let us regard it under 
the different aspects which it presents to our faith. 

The cross of Jesus Christ is the sacred altar whereon 
was immolated the adorable Victim of our salvation ; 
whereon was consummated the bloody sacrifice which 
satisfied divine justice for us, and reconciled us with 
heaven. 



368 • MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

It was on this wood that the Lamb, immolated from 
the beginning in intention and figure, was in reality 
sacrificed in the lapse of time ; it was on this wood that 
the divine Redeemer suffered every torment and all 
manner of ignominy, and through his torn veins 
poured forth all his blood ; it was on this wood that he 
slept the sleep of death, during which he opened to us, 
by a soldier's lance, his side and his heart, in order to 
pour forth upon us, with the last drop of his blood, all 
the treasures of his tenderness. Setting out from the 
moment of his immolation, Ave are no longer children of 
wrath : sin is destroyed, hell is vanquished, peace is 
restored, heaven is opened to us. 

Let us remember then, at sight of the cross, the 
work that was accomplished on that tree of Salvation, 
and bless the God of love who was made a Victim for 
us. Oh ! how that divine Savior has loved us ! All 
proclaims it ; but particularly his cross. Yes, that 
sacred wood is the most expressive monument of his 
love for us ! 

Whosoever truly loves shows it by his devotion to 
those he loves, by the sacrifice of his interest to theirs, 
and, if need be, by the sacrifice of his life. This is the 
last effort of love: for, says Jesus Christ, "Greater 
love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his 
life for his friends."* 

Now, of what does the cross remind us, if not of the 
most absolute devotion of the Son of God to our inter- 
ests, the sacrifice he made for us, and even of his life, 
to save us from eternal death ? 

* St. John, xv. 13. 



OF OUE LORD JESUS CHEIST. 369 

The cross, which speaks to us so eloquently of the 
love of Jesus Christ for men, makes known to us also, 
in the most admirable manner, what it most imports us 
to know and to practise. It is a sublime pulpit from 
which the most precious teachings come down to us. 

The cross makes us think of the goodness of God to 
us, and recalls those words of the Savior : " God so 
loved the world as to give his only-begotten Son"* for 
the salvation of the world. It instructs us even as to 
the value of our soul, the enormity of sin, the rigors of 
divine justice ; and teaches us to die to ourselves to live 
the life of the divine Crucified. 

The cross loudly proclaims the great precept of the 
forgiveness of injuries, of the love of our enemies, of the 
charity that ought to animate the faithful. 

And how is it possible to turn one's eyes on that 
wood, without immediately recalling those maxims of 
the divine Master: "Love your enemies; do good tr 
them that hate you, pray for those who persecute you ; "+ 
and "love one another, as I have loved you!"£ 

Yes, from the cross go forth teachings the most 
sublime and the most salutary. Hence it is the book 
of the elect, that which was read with so much delight 
by St. Bernard, St. Francis of Assisium, St. Bonaven- 
ture, or rather, by all the saints ; for all have said, by 
their conduct, what was said by St. Francis de Sales : 
" It is good for us to be with the cross. Here it is 
that I will watch, that I will read, that I will meditate, 
having that divine book constantly before my eyes and 
my thoughts, to study therein the science of salvation." 
* St. John, iii. 16. \ St. Matt., v. 44. J -St. John, xiii. 34. 



370 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

The saints contemplated the crucifix with faith, and 
by that contemplation their heart was inflamed with 
charity, and their mind enlightened with the brightest and 
purest rays ; so it would be with us if we considered 
ourselves with the same interior dispositions. 

The Savior's cross is the channel of grace. Placed 
between heaven and earth, it is the ladder by which our 
prayers ascend to God, and the effects of his mercy 
come down upon us. 

The sight of the brazen serpent cured the bite of the 
fiery serpent : so does the contemplation of Jesus cruci- 
fied heal our spiritual maladies. How many desolate, 
discouraged souls have found at the foot of the cross 
consolation, hope, and grace to accomplish the greatest, 
the most heroic, sacrifices ! . . . How many sinners, 
kneeling before the cross, have been purified by the 
divine blood which fell from it upon them ! 

The image of the cross is, as it were, constantly 
before our eyes in our houses ; we even carry it about 
us ; we make it on our forehead, on our mouth, on our 
breast ; we are, so to say, identified with it ; it will be 
placed in our hands at our last hour, it will be put to 
our dying lips, and it is before it that we shall breathe 
our last. After our death, it will be placed on our 
body, then over our grave, and thus we shall rest in its 
shadow, awaiting the day of the resurrection. 

Revolving these thoughts in our mind, let us, then, 

say : " Hail, O Cross, my only hope ! "* — pedestal from 

which my soul shall ascend to heaven ; warrant of my 

justification, by which I shall obtain mercy from the 

* Hvmn, Vexilla Reqis. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 371 

Supreme Judge ; tree which repairs the evil committed 
at the foot of the Tree of Knowledge of good and evil ; 
balance in which the Savior's merits outweigh our 
iniquities, and entitle us to eternal felicity ! 

APPLICATION. 

Let us render to the Savior's Cross, in union with the 
Church, the homage of profound veneration : let us 
salute its holy image with respect ; let us honor it 
wherever we meet it ; let us form our pupils to pay it the 
homage due to it ; let us piously kiss our crucifix ; let 
us contemplate with the sweetest emotion that sacred 
object, which recalls to our heart so many precious 
memories ; let us raise our mind and our heart, as it 
were, unceasingly to Jesus immolating himself for us. 

Let us honor the spiritual cross that is our own : let 
us conduct ourselves, in the troubles and afflictions of 
life, as true disciples of the Savior should. 

Let us accept our cross with resignation, thinking 
that it comes to us on the part of God — of that tender 
Father who tries us only because he loves us, and who 
desires our happiness more than we ourselves do. 

Let us bear it with patience, through love for Jesus, 
and with a view to imftate him. Oh ! if we truly loved 
that sweet Savior, how we would appreciate the cross ! 
how fond we would be of it ! how we would bless it for 
giving us that conformity with him ! 

Moreover, what is our cross to his ? For us he 
drained to the dregs the chalice of all humiliation and 
of all sorrow : could we, then, refuse to take some drops 
of it for his sake, and to apply his merits to ourselves % 



372 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

As disciples of Jesus Christ, let us imitate our Master ; 
let us attach ourselves to the cross with him, and there 
remain. Let us be resigned, and even content and 
joyous, in imitation of the saints, saying with St. Teresa : 
" To suffer, or die ; " or with St. Francis Xavier : " Yet 
more ! Lord ! " 

Let us offer to God our sufferings, with a view to 
adore him, to expiate our sins, to draw down his 
graces, remembering that on the cross we are in the 
best situation for making our prayer reach his heart. 

PRAYER. 

O Jesus ! adorable Redeemer ! who, by thy cross, didst 
redeem the world, grant that I may suitably honor that 
sacred wood. Grant, I beseech thee, that imitating 
thee in thy sufferings, I may place myself on the cross 
with thee, and that I may remain thereon till the day 
when by it I shall attain to thine eternal glory. 

(See Resumes, page 120, 2d subject.) 



OP OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 373 

SIXTY-THIRD MEDITATION. 
FIRST SUNDAY OF JULY.-THE PRECIOUS BLOOD. 



Lord, thou hast redeemed us in thy blood.' 1 — Apoc, v. 9. 



CONSIDERATION. 

" We venerate the precious blood which Jesus, dying 
on the cross, shed for us by so many and such cruel 
wounds :" thus it is that the Church, in her office, 
informs us of the object of this feast. "Let this day," 
she adds, " be a memorial for you, and let it be cele- 
brated in all generations."* 

This day is, in fact, the memorial of the shedding of 
the divine blood whereby we have been redeemed, a 
figurative and prophetic effusion, commenced, accom- 
plished, yet mystically continued, and unceasingly pro- 
ducing its salutary effects. 

At that moment when the Son of God offered him- 
self to his Father, saying : u Burnt-offering and sin- 
offering thou didst not require ; then said I, i Behold I 
come/ "t — he pledged himself to shed his blood for the 
expiation of our sins, and by his dispositions, he shed it 
in one sense, for the apostle St. John calls him, " the 
Lamb which was slain from the beginning."! 

As a memorial of that engagement, and to prefigure 

* Office of the Precious Blood. f Pa., xxxix. 7, 8. 

I Apoc, xiii. 8. 



374 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

i 

the object thereof, God "willed that animals should be 
every where immolated, and that blood should flow on 
the altars, under the knives of the priests of his holy 
religion. He prescribed sacrifices that were symbols of 
that which was to be accomplished on Calvary. He 
thus had announced beforehand the bloody immolation 
whereof Jesus Christ was to be the Priest and the Victim. 
Let us also recall what he prescribed in relation to the 
Paschal lamb, and especially those words : " The blood 
shall be unto you for a sign in the houses where you 
shall be."* 

The prophets spoke of the shedding of the divine 
Blood : — " Who is this, 7 ' says Isaiah, " that cometh from 
Edom with dyed garments ? Why is thy apparel red, 
ami thy garments like theirs that tread in the wine- 
press ?"t 

The prophet Zachary, speaking to the Lord, says: 
" Thou, 'also, by the blood of thy Testament hast sent 
forth thy prisoners out of the pit."| 

When the time is accomplished, the Son of God made 
man fulfils his engagement, realizes Avhat had been pre- 
figured, and what he had foretold of himself. Scarce 
has he appeared amongst men, when he yields the first 
fruits of his blood under the knife of Circumcision, and 
binds himself anew to shed the Avhole of it. 

When about to deliver himself to his enemies, he, 
under the sacramental species, gives his blood to his 
Apostles seated at table with him, and tells them, while 
presenting to them the chalice he has consecrated : 
" Drink ye all of this, for this is my blood of the New 
* Exod.. xii. 13. t Isa., lxiii. 1, 2. 1 Zach., ix. 11. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 375 



Testament which shall be shed for many for the remission 



of 



sms 



»# 



He then repairs to the garden of Olives, and there, 
falling into an agony, he sweats, as it were, drops of 
blood which penetrate his clothes and fall even to the 
ground. Thus it is that the Pontiff of the New Law 
enters into the sanctuary, not, like the high priest with 
the blood of goats or calves, but with his own blood, f 

Soon does Judas deliver up the innocent blood which 
he has sold for thirty pieces 5 Jesus is in the power of 
the Jews who, in their turn, deliver him to Pilate. In 
the pretorium, the divine Victim sheds his blood under 
the blows of the scourging, and by the wounds made by 
the crown of thorns. 

Let us accompany him ascending Calvary : we can 
follow him by the marks of his blood, which falls to the 
ground and is contemptuously trampled under foot by 
the deicidal populace. 

Let us arrive with him on the summit of the moun- 
tain. 

Ah ! here is the place of the bloody sacrifice. The 
holy Victim is stretched on the altar ; the veins of his 
hands and feet are broken by horrible blows, and the 
divine blood flows out and reddens the hands and feet 
of the executioners. . . . 

The cross is then raised, and the blood of Jesus con- 
tinues to pour forth : it reddens the wood of the cross, 
and flows, first in waves, then in a lesser quantity, then 
drop by drop ; and it falls before the eyes of Mary ! — 
O tender Mother ! what anguish wrings thy heart at sight 
* St. Matt., xxvi. 27, 28. t Heb., ix. 12. 



376 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

of the shedding of that blood formed of thy blood ! — But 
here human language fails ; no words could describe 
the feelings of the Savior's most Blessed Mother ! . . . 

Finally, let us behold the soldier who, with the thrust 
of a lance, pierces the side and the heart of Jesus, and 
by that wound draws forth the last drop of the Redeem- 
er's blood. 

The divine blood that was shed on Calvary still flows 
in a mystic manner on our altars, where it really and 
substantially is. Everywhere, and without interruption, 
it is present to the eyes of the heavenly Father, and 
produces the same effects ! ! how admirable and how 
salutary are those effects ! but here let us allow the 
saints and the Church to speak : — 

'< The blood of Christ," says St. Paul, " will cleanse 
our conscience."* We find in Jesus Christ, by his 
blood, the remission of sins which makes redemp- 
tion. t " And to the sprinkling of blood, which speaketh 
better than Abel."! " Being now justified by his 
blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him." § 

The Apostle St John says : " Jesus hath loved us, 
and washed us from our sins in his own blood. "j| The 
Saints overcame the dragon " by the blood of the Lamb 
and by the word of their testimony. "<|f 

" The blood of Jesus Christ," says St. Chrysostom, 
" drives the devils away from us, and draws down upon 
us the Angels and the Lord of Angels. The destroying 
Angel entered not where the blood of the paschal Lamb 
was imprinted : what, then, can the angel of darkness 

* Heb., ix. 14. t Col., i. 20. J Heb., xii. 24. 

§ Rom., v. 9. || Apoc, i. 5. 1 Hid., xii. 11. 



OP OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 377 

do to those who are marked with the blood of the Lamb 
who taketh away the sins of the world ?" 

" That blood which thou didst shed, wretched 
demon ! " says St. Augustine, " has vanquished thee, and 
ransomed me. Having drank of it, I fear no more 
the malice of thy venom." 

" blood of Jesus Christ ! " exclaims St. Bernard, 
" thou art on the altar a drink, on the cross our ransom, 
in heaven our defence with God." 

" Mankind," says holy Church, " expected but a dread 
misfortune, the fruit of the first Adam's crime ; but the 
new Adam, by his innocence and his love, has restored 
us tg life. By his blood he has purchased for us an 
eternal redemption. The Father, disarmed, can no 
longer refuse pardon : and whosoever washes his defile- 
ment in that divine blood, acquires a splendor, a beauty, 
like unto that of the angels and fit to please the King of 
kings.* 

APPLICATION. 

While entertaining ourselves with these holy and 
salutary thoughts, let us adore the divine Blood shed 
for our salvation ; let us pay it the homage of the most 
profound veneration, in union with Mary adoring it on 
Calvai-y. 

Let us weep over our sins which rendered its effusion 
necessary. Let us remember that it is on account of 
our iniquities Jesus Christ was crucified, and shed all 
his blood. 

Let us love our generous Redeemer ; let us bless him 
for having made himself a victim in our place. " We 
* Office of the Precious Blood. 



378 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

venerate the precious blood he shed for our salvation : 
ah ! shall we refuse to mingle with it, at least, tears of 
gratitude ? "* 

Let us pray, in all confidence, to God the Father, 
for, through the blood of Jesus Christ, we have all access 
to his heart — the blood of the new Abel ascends to 
heaven, but it is to demand mercy. Let us unite with 
its voice that of our prayer, and we may be sure that 
Ave shall be heard. 

Let us prepare well for holy Communion. Let us 
reflect that the blood of Jesus Christ is therein given us 
as the food of our souls. Let us receive it with a heart 
pure and full of fervor, to the end that, in our regard, 
the saying of the divine Master may be accomplished : 
" He that eateth my flesh, and drmkethmy blood, hath 
everlasting life, and I will raise him up at the last day ; " t 
and that, admitted into his glory, Ave may say to him 
with the saints : " Lord, thou hast redeemed us in thy 
blood, and hast made us to our God a kingdom." \ 

PRAYER. 

O Jesus ! deign, Ave beseech thee, to assist thy ser- 
vants Avhom thou hast redeemed by thy precious blood.§ 
" And thou, O almighty Father ! be propitious unto us. 
Thou hast redeemed us by the blood of thine only Son ; 
thou wilt reign with us by the grace of the holy Spirit: 
vouchsafe to complete thy gifts by crowning us in 
heaA T en." 

(See Resumes, page 128. ) 



* Office of the Precious Blood. t St. John, vi. 55. 

I Apoc, v. 9, 10. § Hymn. Te Deum. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 379 



SIXTY-FOURTH MEDITATION. 

SEPTEMBER 14th -EXALTATION OF THE HOLY 
CROSS. 



" God forbid that I should glory, but in the cross of our Lord 
Jesus Christ." — Gal., vi. 14. 



CONSIDERATION. 

The cross, before the death of Jesus Christ, was an 
instrument of sorrow and of shame, an infamous gibbet 
the sight of which was horrifying : there was nothing 
more vile, nothing more contemptible. 

And now it is the object of the greatest veneration. 
People everywhere celebrate its grandeur, singing with 
the Church : " The standard of the Eternal Monarch is 
displayed. On this wood, the Author of life received 
death, and by his death gave us life. O precious tree ! 
resplendent with glory, chosen to touch the sacred 
members of the Savior and stained with his adorable 
blood."* " cross more brilliant than all the stars, 
celebrated throughout all the earth, worthy of all honor 
from men, holier than all that is holy, and alone worthy 
of bearing the world's ransom ! amiable wood that 
didst receive a burden so precious, save that people 
assembled on this day to sing thy praises ! n i 

* Hymn, Vexilla Regis. t Office of the Exaltation of the 

Holy Cross. 



380 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

It is become the most glorious banner, the very sign 
of honor. It is revered more than it was despised : 
how many diadems make it their principal ornament ! 
What homage has been, and still is rendered to it ! 
Let us call to mind the veneration in which it was held 
by the Emperor Heraclius, the memory of which the 
Church celebrates by the feast of this day. 

But why is its destiny so changed ? It is that the 
Son of God touched it with his hands, carried it on his 
shoulder, suffered upon it his last pains, stained it with 
his blood. Yes, from that day forth it has had every 
title to the veneration of men and angels. 

The Cross is the altar of the great sacrifice that was 
offered up for the reconciliation of man with God ; on 
it was immolated the divine Lamb, whose death is our 
redemption and our life ; on it he who is at once Priest 
and Victim, shed his blood for the glory of God his 
Father and the remission of our sins. 

The Cross is the wood by which justice cometh,* and 
which the prophet had announced ; it is the balance 
wherein the divine body, which is the world's ransom, 
abundantly outweighed the spoils of hell.t 

The Cross is the tree that repaired all the ills which 
sprang from the tree of knowledge of good and eviL 
Near the latter, man was made the slave of pride, of 
covetousness, of sensuality, and found death ; near the 
former, he immolates the triple concupiscence, and 
recovers life. 

The Cross is the triumphal chariot of the Divine 
Savior ; it was on it that he vanquished the devil, that 
* Wisd., xiv. 7. f Hymn, Vexilla Begis. 



OF OUR LOED JESUS CHRIST. 381 

he destroyed the empire of darkness. Hence does the 
Church say: "Publish amongst the nations that the 
Lord triumphs by the wood."* "Behold the cross of the 
Lord : fly, hostile bands ! "t 

The Cross is the beacon pointing out to those who 
sail on the sea of this world, him who is the true light. 
The Cross is the throne of the new Solomon, whence he 
rules over all the earth, and teaches nations true 
wisdom. 

Jesus Christ humbled himself, and on that account 
his Father exalted him ;$ He gave him all nations as 
an inheritance $ He made him King over all things. |j 
Now, it is on the cross that he exercises his dominion ; 
" He rules by the wood,"^[ says the Church, recalling 
the words of David. 

The Cross is the standard of the Supreme Monarch, 
planted in sight of all men, around which the elect 
range themselves ; — the standard that shall see all 
others fall before it, that shall stand alone over the 
ruins of the world, and shall be seen by all the genera- 
tions of men radiant in the heavens. It is the sign of 
the Son of Man,** which shall appear at the last day, 
and fill the wicked with terror, whilst it shall be the 
consolation, the joy, the felicity of the just. 

The Cross, says St. Augustine, is not only the 
sacred altar on which ?Tesus was immolated ; it is the 
pulpit from which that Divine Master instructs us. 
Thence he preaches to us, in the most eloquent manner, 

* Hymn, Vexilla Regis. t Office of the Exaltation of the 

Holy Cross. \ Phil., ii. 8. § Ps., ii. 8. || Ibid., 9. 

f Hymn, Vexilla Regis. ** St. Matt., xxiv. 30. 



382 MEDITATIONS ON THE PASSION 

humility, meekness, patience, pardon of enemies, self- 
denial, devotion, constancy, or rather all the virtues, 
for on the cross he practises them all in their most 
sublime perfection ; and thence he tells us : " You call 
me Master and Lord ; for I have given you an ex- 
ample,"* — will you refuse to follow it, you who are my 
disciples ? 

u From the cross," says St. Leo, " the Savior re- 
bukes the effeminacy of worldlings by his sufferings ; 
their inordinate love of riches, by his destitution ; their 
pomp and their pride, by his humility." Thence he 
beatifies poverty, humiliations, tears ; he is there the 
pattern shown us on the mountain, t and to which we 
must be conformable. 

Happy are they who hear and practise these divine 
lessons, and who can say with the Apostle : " I glory 
only in the cross of Jesus Christ, and him crucified. "f 

The Cross is the intermediary between heaven and 
earth : by it the divine mercy comes to us $ by it we go 
to God ; Jesus on the cross draws souls to himself and 
raises them to his Father, according as he had said of 
himself: " When I shall be lifted up from earth, I will 
draw all things to myself."^ 

The Cross is the monument of the love of Jesus for 
men : what testimony does it not give of his charity ! 
It tells us that he loved us so as to " be made a curse 
for us," || to suffer every pain, to shed all his blood, and 
to give his life for our salvation. It tells us that his 
love was stronger than death 5 that when his heart had 

* St. John, xiii. 13, 15. t Exod., xxv. 40. \ Gal., vi. 14. 
§ St. John, xii. 32. || Gal., iii. 13. 



OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 383 

ceased to beat, he was still consumed with love for us, 
and gave us the pledge thereof, by opening to pour out 
the last drops of the blood of redemption. 

The Cross is the symbol of our belief, the distinctive 
sign of Christians, the foundation of our hope, the fuel 
of the fire of charity, the source of the greatest good. 

We must then bless, exalt, glorify it, and make known 
to men that admirable invention of God. 

APPLICATION. 

Let us render to the cross the worship due to it. 
Let us salute it with respect. Let us contribute, as we 
should in our employment, to make it honored and 
respected. 

Let us make the sign of the cross with faith and 
devotion : let us arm ourselves with it in temptation, 
remembering that it is by this sign we conquer the 
enemy of our salvation. 

Let us carry the crucifix religiously about us. After 
the example of the saints, let us press it to our hearts, 
kiss it with affection, contemplate it with piety, meditate 
on the facts it recalls to us, and therewith nourish our 
mind and our heart. 

Let us renew ourselves in love and gratitude to Jesus 
Christ. The cross tells us how he has loved us : should 
it not tell us how we ought to love him, and what should 
be our devotion to his glory ? 

Let us beg of Jesus crucified the grace of exalting 
his holy cross by love and esteem for the spiritual 
cross lie has destined for us. Let us think that the 
latter — how repugnant soever its aspect may be to our 



384 MEDITATIONS ON OUR LORD'S PASSION. 

nature — is a present from the divine goodness, a testi- 
monial of the love of Jesus for us, the way by which he 
he wishes to conduct us to heaven. 

Let us accept it, therefore, with resignation, and say, 
in union with all the saints : " O Cross, thou art my hope, 
my consolation, my joy ! Be my bed of rest : it is in 
thine arms that I wish to live and die ! " 

PRAYER. 

Divine Savior ! who callest me to imitate thee, and 
who wouldst render me a participator in the glory thou 
hast acquired for thyself by thy labors and thy suffer- 
ings, grant me the grace of patience in the troubles and 
adversities of life ! Grant that, contemplating thee on 
the cross, I may place myself there with thee, and so 
remain till the day when the cross shall give me admis- 
sion to thine eternal kingdom. 

(See Resumes, page 142, 2d subject.) 



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